


False Perception

by archieknight



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Bipolar Andrew Minyard, Bipolar Disorder, Butcher!Neil, F/M, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Psychic Bond, Raven!Neil, Slow Burn, Trauma, Twins, ghost!neil, telepath!aaron, telepath!andrew, twin telepathy, twinyards character study, witch!katelyn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-03-01 18:07:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 25
Words: 34,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13300374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/archieknight/pseuds/archieknight
Summary: False perceptions and altered reflections, in a house made of shattered glass. Secrets are only safe with dead men and the truth-seekers who so easily converse with them.playlist





	1. GIVE UP THE GHOST

Aaron stepped into the house. He now faced a grand mahogany staircase that wrapped around the corner of the room to lead to the next floor. It was freshly dusted for inspection of possible buyers, but the smell still haunted the air. He watched his brother and cousin disperse into different rooms to look around while he stayed next to the estate agent, who spoke in a rehearsed tone about the history of the area.

Andrew walked back into the entryway, giving Aaron a knowing glance that developed into an eyeroll. He stepped up a few of the treads before settling to sit halfway up the staircase. He tapped his feet impatiently on the boards. Aaron ignored him and nodded along to the estate agent’s noise, then interjected, "I hear there's a basement?"

"Yes, it's a bit dark, but a little bit of work and some nice lights, it could be a great space. Somewhere cool to hang out," she laughed nervously. "Let's go look upstairs first."

Aaron gave such a disinterested tone, it really showed just how related he and Andrew were.

"Awesome."

She put her foot on the first step, expecting Andrew to move. He didn't. "Excuse me, sir," she said politely. Andrew looked up at her, unimpressed, before standing up to walk upstairs ahead of the others. Nicky eventually trailed behind and they stood in the hallway as she reeled off the list of rooms, "There's the master bedroom, with en suite. There's a double guest room. Two twin size rooms," she stopped at that to gesture at Aaron and Andrew, a grin beaming.

"They don't share," Nicky joked with her. 

"Well, there's another single. Will it just be you three?" The way she asked it didn't show she wanted to help, it showed that she wanted to know how three twenty-somethings could afford a five-bedroom in the suburbs of Baltimore, even at the significantly reduced price. The other two could sense how irritated Andrew was getting, but it didn't take much. 

"Yeah, for now. We were thinking about letting a room to some other college students when the semester starts," Nicky explained.

She smiled with thin lips, "That's very clever." 

_Condescending bitch,_ thought Andrew loudly.

Aaron winced, _Stop that._

_I'm just saying, she's suspicious of us._

_Well, we are buying the house with blood money._

_Inheritance,_ Andrew corrected him.

_Whatever, she's going to get more suspicious when Nicky stops talking._

_That's never going to happen, don't you worry._

Nicky had noticed the two were having a silent exchange, so directed the real estate agent towards the other end of the hall and asked her about lodgers and rent prices. He knew what he was talking about, but wanted to distract her from his creepy twin cousins. He was used to their eccentricities, as much as he wished they wouldn't do it around strangers. 

Two months later, they were moving into the house. The three of them were dragging their belongings inside to abandon them in the living room, all exhausted from the drive and the heavy lifting. "You two," Nicky pointed between the twins, who stood at opposite ends of the living room, "Are going to be the death of me. I don't care about the psychic energy of the house or whatever, I'm going to have a heart attack if I walk up those stairs one more time."

"You seemed perfectly happy to throw parties here. You should be thankful we agreed to that; it's way too much disturbance if we want to find anything," Aaron argued, dropping a box of books onto the hardwood floor with a clunk.

"And what is ‘anything’?" Nicky countered, leaning his back against the wall in exhaustion.

Andrew answered for his twin, "Exactly that. We could find anything. The Butcher of Baltimore had a high enough body count that any of their souls could have been condemned to this house. Anyway, it's better than the ghosts we have back in Columbia."

The last statement cast an eerie silence across the room, only broken by the sound of the door shutting behind Aaron as he went back out to the removal van. 

"You're just trying to upset him now," Nicky groaned at Andrew. 

"I'm just telling the truth," Andrew defended himself, "He'd know if I lied."

Nicky rolled his eyes. "There's a difference between telling the truth and reopening wounds."

"Whatever. I, of all people, know that repressing that kind of shit isn't going to help anything," he said, arrogance thick in his tone but no malicious intent behind his words.

"People deal with trauma differently. He wants a new life. Let him have it."

"I gave him his new life, If it wasn't for me, he would still be in that rathole with Tilda. Or worse.” Aaron still remained in that rathole, as long as he ignored what happened. Tilda didn’t need to beat him every night, Aaron had learned to do that to himself. He was stuck in the mind of his 17 year old self, and Andrew just wanted him to move on. 

“I'm not asking for a thank you, I am asking for him to admit it happened." Andrew spoke in harsh whispers through gritted teeth, as Aaron was only outside. He'd managed to keep Aaron out of his thoughts, but he knew Aaron was feeling how he felt. The frustration hung in the room, pulling down the ceiling and letting the walls cave in- they could both feel it.

Andrew and Aaron's connection had never been this strong. As children, they felt each other's pain inexplicably. Aaron would have panic attacks out of nowhere, endure nightmares of things he'd never seen before, and live wracked with paranoia. Andrew could feel echoes of punches in his skull with no cause, giving him migraines. He felt sudden bouts of anger that had nowhere to go. 

After they met, they learned to communicate wordlessly, but they couldn't read each other's minds, that’s not how it worked. Andrew felt Aaron's pain more strongly now they were so close. Every time Tilda hit him, he felt each invisible bruise on his skin, had his breath knocked out of him, but couldn't do anything about it. The pain stirred inside him, something like power, until it became too much.

Yet it was nothing compared to Aaron's, maybe Andrew was weak. He had a hunch that's what Aaron thought it was, him getting rid of their mother because of how it affected him. But maybe- just maybe- it was compassion. He had empathy, he could understand Aaron's pain, and feel it to an extent. But one would doubt Andrew's ability to act on it, considering he was emotionally detached and sporadically violent. Perhaps he was just proving it with how far he would go to protect Aaron. 

He didn't even know if he'd survive, but he was willing to take himself out if it rid the world of Tilda, if it gave Aaron a chance at a happy life. They'd only known each other five months when it happened, but Aaron was sure that if Andrew had died in that car, it would've felt like losing an arm. No matter how disconnected things got between them, there was always this gut instinct to protect each other.

Aaron returned dragging two suitcases through the door, each clattering against the other as he tried to maneuver himself and his luggage inside. Nicky looked to Andrew expectantly, who sighed with a roll of his eyes, and strode over to help his twin. He took one suitcase in hand and took it upstairs. He dropped it off in his brother’s new room and flopped onto the bed. _I really drew the short straw, this is nice._

 _Lies, you sense there’s something in your room._ Aaron retorted, he knew when Andrew didn’t argue to claim the master bedroom that there was something drawing him to the single room next to it.

 _Of course I do. What’s the point in living in a haunted house if you are not going to meet the neighbours?_ Andrew shuffled so he was leaning on his elbows, he looked up at Aaron, who was leaning against the closet. Upon noticing Andrew’s movement, he met his eyes.

 _But they’re not your neighbour, and it’s one thing to communicate with them, but to sleep in there?_ Aaron shivered.

Andrew was drawn to the dark energy (and the massively decreased price) of the house, and if he was going to live there, he wanted to find out what really happened. He knew about the Butcher of Baltimore, a violent criminal infamous for slicing up people who betrayed him with a cleaver. He was eventually killed by his own brother-in-law in protection of The Butcher’s son, who was among the many to die that night. Added on to the men and women Nathan Wesninski had previously murdered by his own hand, the house had swallowed enough lives to become a hotspot for supernatural activity. Maybe even The Butcher’s soul was condemned to the house, they could hope not.

Aaron thought practically; he was disinterested in how he could use his abilities. They were originally looking for a place in the area because Aaron had been accepted into UMB before the house had caught their eye. When living with his mother, Aaron would find any excuse to get out of the house away from her. He stayed after school in the library for an hour every evening, save Wednesdays, when he practised with the school’s Exy team. His dedicated avoidance secured him a scholarship, and Nicky encouraged him to take the opportunity wholeheartedly. He even postponed his return to Germany to stay with him for his freshman year.

 _You’re paranoid,_ Andrew noted.

_And you’re not?_


	2. PARANOIA

Something Andrew had grown to like was the quiet of the house. He could hear every footstep, every opening door, every text alert on each of their phones. He quickly adjusted to this until he could guess what room they were in judging from the distance and direction of the sound. Things like this eased his paranoia, and let him settle into their new home.

It was late July, and their time flashed by in a cycle of night shifts and afternoon beers. Nicky’s bright charm and people skills had scored him and Andrew full-time work at a local bar, specifically a gay bar.

“You will have to pretend to be gay though,” Nicky explained after he enthused about the place.

Andrew hummed, “How gay?”

“I don’t know, like, flirt with the customers? Smile more,” Nicky shrugged, without hope that his cousin could achieve either of those things.

“Are straight people inherently unhappy?” Andrew asked, skeptical.

“Yes,” Aaron cut in, “Yes I am.”

Refusing Nicky’s offer, Aaron had set himself up with a part-time job at an on-campus cafe so he could work around his study. All this lead to the cousins so caught up in their new schedules that summer was over before they’d noticed the sun come out.

Once Aaron was at college and Nicky had made friends in the area, the house became even quieter. During the day when Andrew couldn’t sleep, he started to spend his time walking through each room of the house. He tried to sense the way temperatures dropped in different places, the unheard sounds each room had to offer. By far, the worst room was the basement. Andrew couldn’t bear the sick, suffocating feeling it gave him.

He was sitting on the top of the stairs that led down to the basement, elbows leant on his knees and fingers tapping his knuckles in thought. He had work in a few hours and hadn’t slept since before last night’s shift. His eyes blurred in exhaustion, and maybe it was the sleep deprivation, but he was sure he saw something move in the corner of the basement and disappear into the dark.

He pulled out his phone and turned the flashlight on, scanning the room with it. He saw tall, dusty shelves lining the walls and a worktop in the centre of the room. He stepped deeper into the room. His heart pounded in his chest, begging him to retreat back upstairs. Abandoning instinct, he searched for a source of reflection or sign of movement, something that could explain what he’d seen.

Finding no trace, Andrew tried to follow his gut instinct. By that, he meant do exactly what his heart told him not to do. He walked between the shelves and table to reach the back of the room, surveying the walls. There was a small door behind the other shelf. He squinted at it to make sure it wasn’t just an irregularity in the brickwork, or a panel of wood against the wall. He squatted to see a handle at the bottom. Definitely a door.

He adjusted his stance and pulled on the shelf. Overestimating its weight, he let it topple across the room onto the worktop. He jumped back in shock, dropping his phone. The room went black. Dust knocked off the metal and into the air, blurring the few shapes he could still make out.

“It’s locked- don’t bother.”

His eyes darted to the light from the top of the stairs, but there was no silhouette standing there. The voice instead came from behind him, he pivoted on one foot. The knee-jerk reaction was to swing a punch behind him, but he fell through the motion and stumbled over the sooty air. He blinked and let his eyes focus.

Standing a metre or two away was a thin figure which was hunched in a way that it was hard to see its face from under a mop of hair. He spoke in a muttered tone; maybe not nervous but certainly annoyed. Andrew straightened his posture. He’d sensed spirits before, seen them, but never had one acknowledged his sight and spoken to him.

“Where does it go?” Andrew asked, completely ignoring the fact that this boy had appeared out of nowhere.

He looked up and Andrew noted the pallor that of his skin that made his whole body look like smoke, the only colour that showed on him in the dark room was his bright blue eyes. He was dressed in a short-sleeved shirt that billowed over his torso in a way you’d expect from a ghost. He couldn’t have been an older than Andrew himself- when he died at least.

“To the garage,” he replied as if Andrew was a tourist who was asking for directions.

“Nifty,” Andrew murmured his reply, glancing at the locked door. He checked it anyway, tugging upwards at the handle to no avail.

The spirit let out a single huff of laughter. “What? Was I going to lie to you that it was locked?”

“Well I don’t know,” Andrew sighed. “I do not know your intentions.”

“Things may be pretty boring here, but I don’t go around trying to mildly inconvenience people’s days like that.”

The boy spoke in a casual tone, it was friendly on the surface, but there was a sharp prick of ridicule. He crossed his arms over his seemingly hollow chest, before leaning over to talk to Andrew as if he was any taller than him.

Andrew raised an unimpressed eyebrow and said, “What do you do? Haunt their ankles?”

He stepped closer to Andrew, who felt the cold of his core drift against his skin. It was invasive and Andrew felt the icy presence deep in his chest. Still, it didn’t chill him in the way human touch did. “What was that, half-pint?” A flippant smile played on his lips, paper thin and razor sharp.

“Step away,” Andrew warned.

His anger glowed off him like burning heat, only extinguished when the boy stepped straight through him. Andrew flinched to turn to where the boy was standing, already facing him with a smug smirk.

A low buzzing came from beneath them. Andrew glanced down to see his dropped phone lit up with the screen displaying Aaron’s name.

 _Why do you bother calling?_ He asked, looking up at the ceiling.

Aaron’s reply was instant and disgruntled. _Because I’m not fucking weird, where are you?_

 _The basement. I’ll be up in a minute._ Andrew noticed the spirit leave out of the corner of his eye, but was unsure of which direction he headed.

 _And you say I’m weird,_ Aaron groaned. _What are you doing down there?_

Andrew didn’t respond, but he picked up his phone and left the basement. He took his time crawling up the stairs, feeling the sure shift in the atmosphere again. It made him shudder slightly.

By the time he greeted Aaron in the kitchen, their previous conversation was forgotten. Aaron had thrown a backpack full of textbooks to the kitchen table, letting a few stray papers flutter out across the table. Then turned around to make coffee.

Looking at Aaron was like looking into a mirror in a dream, like a memory where everything slightly distorted. His eyes darker, his hair neater, his face thinner.

 _Did you have any reason to call me up here?_ Andrew asked him, as he surveyed the pieces of paper.

Aaron turned to look at him before leaning against the counter and sighing. “Just wanted to look at you to remember, my life could always be worse.” He joked bitterly.

“Yeah, you could have an arrogant dumbass for a brother,” Andrew returned.

“Coffee?” He offered. They were both used to the spiteful comments, a product of their callous exteriors. But neither of them cared for petty arguments, so on the surface, they got along.

Andrew nodded and hummed. He looked at his phone to inspect the damage the concrete floor had left, but was quickly distracted by the time displayed on the screen. It was 9:34 pm. Firstly, Andrew wondered why it took Aaron so long to get back from college. Secondly, he realised he started his shift at 10 pm. Fuck, he thought. He didn’t mean to hiss it in Aaron’s mind, but it slipped out as any mindless exclamation would.

He abandoned his coffee on the counter and darted up to his room to get changed. He threw on a work-appropriate black button-up shirt in replacement of the grey, wine-stained one he was wearing the previous night. He stretched his armbands over his forearms and made for the door.

He got to work two minutes late. Immediately he was greeted by Matt, who gave him a quick friendly smile from behind the bar as he placed fresh bottles of spirits onto the shelves. “Jeez, Andrew, did you sleep at all?”

Andrew was making an effort to not be outwardly uncivil with his co-workers, so he gave a solemn -almost theatrically so- shake of his head, to which Matt chuckled. “It’s a Tuesday anyway, the only people here today are students and alcoholics.”

“Are those really separate demographics?”

Matt laughed a nervous, robotic laugh again, “good point.”

Andrew was realised he was right when the club quickly filled with rowdy college kids. The blaring loud music of the club made him appreciate the silent solitude of the house even more. Shouts called him over for drinks, only slightly muffled by the repetitive beats that drowned the room. As much as he hated the noise, he tried his best to not get fired for punching the perverted old guys that came in to talk to the college kids that were regulars. He tried.

He failed. Often.

There was a boy, no older than 20. Not old enough to be drinking here, definitely not old enough to be talking to the man next to him at the bar. As he served the rest of the crowd, he kept a watchful eye on the kid. He couldn’t sense his discomfort like he usually would, but couldn’t imagine he was anything but uncomfortable with that way that guy was leaning into him. He was drunk, oblivious and dazed.

Every time Andrew glanced over, he was closer to the kid. The way he loomed over the kid, taking up all the space around and above him, made Andrew sick to his stomach. The horribly familiar scene made his skin crawl and his fists clenched tightly. Eventually, he couldn’t take it, so when the guy arrogantly called him over to order a drink. He put on the most (terrifyingly) forced smile he could, and strode over. “What would you like?”

“Two vodka and cokes,” He replied, signalling two with his fingers.

Andrew looked him up and down, then turned to look at the boy. “I think he’s had enough, don’t you?”

The man looked shocked at Andrew’s comment, eyebrows knitted and mouth gaped open. “Just make the drinks,” He said sneeringly.

Andrew contained his rage until he gathered enough evidence so that he wouldn’t get fired for dropping this man. “Alright, I’m going to have to ask for ID.”

The man reached for his wallet before Andrew interrupted him, “no. Not yours, we don’t do senior citizens discounts.” He pointed to the drowsy looking boy next to him. “His.”

“No one gets carded here,” the old guy snorted. While he was talking, the boy took out his ID and handed it to Andrew, who took it with a nod.

“Says here that Mr Kevin Day is 20 years old, as of the 22nd of February. I can’t serve you,” He said derisively.

The old guy was scandalized by Andrew’s insolence, used to having drugged-up twinks fall over him. “Look, make the damn drinks and stop getting involved in other people’s business. It’s not your job.” He tapped his fat, stubby fingers on the bar in a way he must have thought was authoritative as he spoke. He looked like a toddler having a tantrum.”

“Kevin,” he handed the ID back to him, “Do you want this dude to leave you alone?”

He stuttered, “I- I mean, uh,” he turned to the guy as if seeing him for the first time. “Yeah, actually.”

“You heard him,” Andrew said, leaning across the bar in a condescending manner. “Run along.”

“Who do you think you are?”

Andrew had a habit. It was all due to the fact that time travel didn’t exist. When he saw someone that reminded him of his younger self, he got this itchy feeling that made him adamant on protecting them. He did it to Aaron too, which Aaron hated. The world had been unjust to him; maybe he wished someone had been there so dedicatedly for him, but he knew he would have denied their help in the same way Aaron does. He wouldn’t have taken the help the way Kevin Day had.

“I’m talking to you! You’re making assumptions about me,” he shouted over the pulsing beat of the music.

“Assumed what? You were taking your son out for a drink.”

He denied Andrew’s statements in stutters.

“Or,” Andrew faked deep thought, “were you thinking that just one more drink and he’d be incapacitated enough for you to take him home?”

“I should speak to your boss.”

Kevin was hunched over nervously next to him. He edged away like he wanted to leave but couldn’t take his eyes off their confrontation.

“Should you?” He gestured to Matt. Matt never got customers acting like this to him, being 6 feet tall and about 3 feet wide. Andrew’s strength came from his ability to take a hit as well as he could throw one. “I’m sure he’ll agree very much that you should leave this child alone, and he won’t be as patient. Or do you want to take your chances with me?”

“What are you gonna do, half-pint?”

In response, Andrew grabbed the small patch of hair the man had remaining and used it to ram his head into the bar. He watched the man bounce back and fall off his stool. He took a small moment to glance to Kevin, whose eyes were wide in shock. Then he walked over to Matt, “I’m going for my smoke break, you got this?”

Matt hadn’t noticed the confrontation in the busy chatter on the club, so he just smiled and nodded. Andrew walked out the back door into an alley. He sighed as he rested his back against the cold wall of the club, letting his head fall back onto it. He smoked two cigarettes in a row, hoping it would tide him over until the end of his shift. Also to procrastinate going back inside, but he’d had enough reasons to get fired today, so he went back in when he stubbed out the second prematurely.


	3. WHO WERE YOU?

Sometimes Aaron and Andrew’s psychic bond was a little too strong, at all the wrong times. The pulsing feeling Aaron sensed from his brother’s head kept him awake until the early hours of the morning. And the jittery beat of Aaron’s anxious heart kept Andrew wandering the house during the day. This ended in two very irritable boys on very few hours sleep, only passing each other in brief moments of their opposing schedules. 

And in those moments, they utterly despised each other. 

Aaron’s wall were built even higher. Andrew couldn’t sense him, or feel what he was feeling. It was like half his body had gone numb. He tried a few times to contact him, but Aaron was blocking his thoughts out. He walked down the hallway until he stopped outside Aaron’s bedroom door. 

_I can’t sleep either, blocking me out isn’t helping._

“Get out of my head,” he said firmly from the other side of the door.

Andrew sighed and walked back to his room, knowing that stubbornness was a trait they both got from their mother, and there was no point in trying. 

“What was that about?” 

He whipped his head around so fast he made himself dizzy, expecting to see Aaron. Instead, it was the loudmouth ghost from the basement. His face dropped seeing him, he didn’t like the spirit on their first meeting and as much as he hoped there was something to investigate in this house, he had hoped his encounter with this specific spirit was a one off. 

“None of your business,” he whispered gratingly. 

The boy ran his hand across the wall mindlessly, “you’re in my room.” He said offhandedly, looking around distantly. He was oddly graceful, tiny and delicate. His hands were bony and pale, even compared to the pale blue walls. Now in the light, Andrew could see his faded red hair, disheveled and falling over his thin face. 

“Who are you?” Andrew asked, his voice more sure now.

“Answer my question first,” he said as he looked to Andrew. His bright blue eyes stared straight through Andrew in a way that made him shift uncomfortably. 

Andrew sighed, “okay, we’re doing that.” The boy nodded. “He hates me because he thinks that I am the reason for all his issues, of which he has many.”

“Why did he tell you to get out of his head?” 

“Your turn,” Andrew replied. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to explain their telepathy to the ghost, as his belief for the supernatural would be unwavering, he just wanted his answers first.

“I’m Neil,” the boy told him. 

“I asked you who you are, not what your name was,” Andrew said, “that is not how this game works.”

“I’m not anyone anymore, the name’s all you need,” Neil shrugged. His cryptic tone made Andrew wish he could punch him.

“Fine,” he groaned, “He told me to get out of his head because we’re telepaths. The bond gives us migraines.” It felt weird saying us, it was always me or him, never a single unit. It made Andrew on edge. 

“You can read minds?” Neil knitted his eyebrows as if Andrew was the strange one in the room (for once, he wasn’t).

“Not quite,” Andrew had already answered a question out of turn, he noted that for future reference. “Who were you?”

Neil locked his intensely hollow eyes with Andrew’s, he looked scared, but he spoke surely. “I lived here…” he caught himself and quickly cooked up a lie, “well, I died 30 years ago.”

“Don’t bullshit me, you’re wearing Air Max 97s,” Andrew glanced down at the ghost’s trainers, which were stained and floating slightly over the ground.

Neil speeded swiftly past him and out of the room, Andrew started after him but by the time he opened the door, Neil was out of sight and he was sure he wouldn’t see him again for a while. Even if he did, he’d probably disappear again just as quick. Just when Andrew was staring down the hall, a gust of wind shut all the doors on the floor with a boom. In the wake of the noise, the door at the other end of the hall opened with a creak.

Aaron stumbled out of the room, eyebrows furrowed over his tired eyes. He looked at each door before his eyes met Andrew’s. He realised something inexplicable had gone on and decided to ignore it in the same way he ignored Andrew’s communication. 

Great, Andrew thought, letting his inner voice speak like anyone else’s would, as Aaron wouldn’t listen. We have a pathological liar for a poltergeist.  
Flinging himself onto his bed, Aaron exhaled deeply. He was sick of Andrew, sick of hearing his voice, sick of this house, sick of the chilly feeling that came with it. He was tired, tired of college, tired of talking to privileged kids who bought their way in, tired of homework, tired of goddamn mitosis. Sick and tired. 

He was exhausted, almost asleep when he heard a knock at his bedroom door. _Go away,_ he said, he couldn’t find his words in his throat. There was no telepathic reply, but another knock. So he guessed it was Nicky. 

He dragged his body off the bed and opened the door, looking expectantly at Nicky.

“I heard doors slamming, did something happen with you two?” He asked, a half-frown on his lips and big brown eyes just dripping with sympathy.

“Wasn’t me,” Aaron shrugged. He knew what it was, there was something haunting the house, he could just hope and pray that it wasn’t Nathan Wesninski.

Nicky’s frown deepened, “hm, okay. Andrew?”

“Haven’t seen him,” Aaron was almost not lying, he’d been avoiding Andrew for days. Guilt only reached him when he woke up to see a tupperware box of pasta left in the fridge with his name on when he woke up for class. The note was in Andrew’s strange cursive writing with both “A”s of his name in capital letters spelling AAron.

Aaron shrugged it off, Andrew was trying to get his attention now. He didn’t care. “If he wanted you to ignore him, he wouldn’t have left Columbia for you.”

“He didn’t leave Columbia for me, he left because he wanted to go ghost hunting instead of doing something with his life.” Aaron seethed, his grip tightening on the door.

Nicky’s eyes thinned to slits and that’s when Aaron noticed the heavy bags under his eyes that Aaron and Andrew both sported. Nicky never showed when he was weak or tired, he’d always stayed strong for his cousins. They were all adults now, he didn’t need to look after them, but that didn’t stop him. “He cares, even if he doesn’t show it, don’t you know that by now?”

“I know what he wants me to know,” Aaron shrugged, “He doesn’t want me to know he cares, so does he really?”

“You know he’s got his own issues,” Nicky said, his voice hushed. Andrew didn’t like it when they mentioned Andrew’s problems, it felt too much like pity, too much like observation. He dealt with them his own way. 

“No I don’t, he doesn’t want me to know,” sneered Aaron.

Nicky slapped both his palms over his face and dragged them down to rub his eyes with a long groan, “you two are exhausting.”

“Get some sleep, Nicky.” His tone was more sympathetic now he pushed thoughts of his twin away.

Nicky grunted, “I can’t. Andrew was right about this place, there’s something very wrong with it. I can’t imagine how it’s affecting you too.” Aaron lifted his shoulders and put his hand out in a vague gesture, “Oh, that’s what this is about?”

“S’pose.”


	4. GRAVE SECRETS

A wise man once said “Hard work pays off”. Aaron wasn’t sure who this wise man was, but he was wrong. Aaron spent every waking moment of his day working, balancing classes and shifts at the cafe. He had since high school, but that had been to avoid Tilda mostly. He worked hard to get himself out of that house, and hated that Andrew tried to take credit. Sometimes hard work doesn’t get you where you want, money does. And since Aaron had none, he invested the few hours of spare time in his week to playing Exy.

The team was mostly made up of jocks who bought their way through life, Aaron felt like the odd one out- not for the first time. But, he made attempts to become one of them. He laughed at their sexist jokes about the cheerleaders, he indulged them in weightlifting competitions at the gym. The problem was, they would invite him to parties he had no time for. So he ended up making friends with the only person on the team with a life as lifeless as his, so that they’d never hang out outside of Exy. 

He didn’t think that one friend would be Kevin Day, “son of Exy”. Aaron found out that he’d transferred to UMB after a skiing accident that crippled his career. But the way he spoke about it suggested that something more personal had taken him off the court at Evermore. Aaron never dared ask, but sometimes Kevin would let the odd fact slip.

Kevin darted past Aaron so quick that he had swung the ball into the goal before Aaron had a chance to turn around (in all fairness, they were the only two on the court, so there was no goalkeeper to block his shot). “How did you do that?” Aaron laughed, out of breath and sweating.

Kevin pulled out his arms daringly, ball in one, racquet in the other. “What? I’m never going to outstrength you, but your reactions are _slow._ ”

“Fuck you,” Aaron smiled, it was fake but friendly. “Just because you were genetically engineered for Exy or something.”

“Just indoctrinated,” Kevin chuckled, dropping the ball so he could catch it with his racquet when it bounced back. “Let’s play.”

Aaron sighed theatrically and adjusted his position so he could block Kevin from the goal, shifting his weight from foot to foot in anticipation. 

Kevin attempted to bounce the ball off the wall and dive around Aaron in the same way he had last time, but this time Aaron blocked the shot before it hit the wall, catching the ball in his racquet by a miracle. 

“Just in time,” Kevin grinned. 

Aaron furrowed his eyebrows, “what?” Kevin’s eyes were trained behind Aaron, so he whipped his head around to see what he was looking at. The cheerleading squad had walked on the court to practise, he scanned their faced quickly before he saw a flicker of strawberry blonde ponytail flash from the huddle of girls. He turned back to his teammate, “Fuck, they practise on Tuesdays?”

“Maybe they do, maybe Katelyn realised you practise on Tuesdays.”

Panic was clear on Aaron’s wide-eyed expression, something Kevin hadn’t seen from Aaron’s usually inscrutable face. “No,” he whispered, pulling out the O sound.

“Yes,” Kevin imitated his tone. “Go say hi.”

“No,” he repeated his whisper.

Kevin sighed and took off his helmet, “whatever, I’m going to go shower before they start thinking I’m a pervert.” He announced before walking off, Aaron quickly rushed after him. 

He took one last glance to check he really had seen Katelyn, it was a mistake. She spotted him and gave him a small wave, and a bright smile to go with it. Aaron felt his heartbeat in his stomach.

Neil was avoiding Andrew- it was a weird thing to say, considering Neil was a ghost that Andrew only met a few days prior. But it wasn’t just that; everytime Andrew walked towards a room, the door would slam shut in front of him, whenever he tried to turn a light on, it would immediately switch back off, furniture would shift slightly to the side to catch Andrew’s knees when he walked.

“I thought you didn’t mildly inconvenience people’s days?” Andrew asked into thin air.

“It’s funny when it’s you,” replied a disembodied voice that could only be Neil.

“I am glad to be of entertainment- where are you?” Andrew asked in a blunt tone.

“Right in front of you,” Neil said. Now he mentioned it, Andrew could feel the cool air that surrounded Neil, but he still couldn’t see him. Andrew’s chest warmed with satisfaction because it meant every time Andrew had seen Neil, Neil had wanted to be seen, and knowing that made him feel that he had one-up on the spirit. 

Andrew looked vacantly at the space ahead of him, “I still have a question. Why did you lie to me?”

Neil fluttered into view for a brief moment, but faded just as quickly. 

“Don’t avoid this,” Andrew said firmly, he could see no reason for a dead boy to lie.

This time when Neil’s form appeared again, it was a few steps back from Andrew. “Why should I tell you?” He asked, his blue eyes seeming a shade darker and the stern look he gave made him look older.

“You have no one else to tell.”

Neil pursed his lips, his eyes flickered in a very strange way that looked like he was dreaming. “You know about The Butcher of Baltimore?”

“Everyone in this neighbourhood does,” Andrew’s reply was sarcastic but not unhelpful.

“He killed me,” Neil admitted. “I used to run some of his product, they needed some fresh cut white kid who wouldn’t get pulled over by any cops. Not that any of the cops would at that time, too easily swayed by money. Anyway, I worked for him for a while. Then some product started going missing, he picked off each of his delivery boys until he found out who did it.”

“I don’t believe you,” Andrew said bluntly. 

Neil squinted at him, “huh?”

“I don’t believe you.” He repeated himself.

“Why?”

He took out a pack of cigarettes and put one in his mouth. “For one,” he murmured over it as he lit it, “that was way too much detail to be the truth.” He dragged out his speech to furtherly irritate Neil. He breathed in the smoke, holding it before saying, “Also, you said to me that I was in your room.”  
Neil didn’t respond, but when Andrew breathed out his smoke, he closed his eyes and inhaled slowly through his nose as if ghosts could smell. 

“Do not disappear this time,” Andrew ordered. Neil opened his eyes in sharp reaction. 

“That’s where I died, I mean,” Neil explained, determined to stick to his story. He ran his bony fingers through his hair and Andrew noticed a tattoo with the number three on it that sat on his cheekbone, hidden by a strand of auburn hair. It seemed silly that he had never noticed it before, but then Neil push the hair back over it and Andrew was sure it was something he did not wear with any pride. He wondered if it was something to do with Wesninski’s gang.

“Not in the basement?” Andrew asked, now he was poking holes in the story, just to get at him.

Neil shook his head, “You don’t have to believe me.”

“I don’t.”

“Great.”

And with that, Neil was gone again. Andrew was getting as sick of Neil disappearing as he was of Neil appearing. He’d make a decision on which he hated more next time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my god!?!?! i'm updating daily?!?!?!?! yeah don't get used to it (im lying ive got the next few chapters ready im just not quite ready to part with them)
> 
> pls leave kudos and comment validation keeps me going


	5. DAY BY DAY

Between Exy and classes, Aaron worked at the on-campus cafe. It was better than Andrew and Nicky’s job at the bar- the customers were quieter and sober (usually, but the worst of the noise came from his teammates, and he’d only seen a _few_ students slip vodka into their coffees). 

“Table four,” his boss told him as she skidded past in a flurry. He nodded and made his way over.

“Good afternoon, what would you guys like?” He asked in a monotone voice, only cracking when he scanned the faces at the table to meet with Katelyn’s deep brown eyes. 

She smiled at him as if she didn’t notice the way his voice faltered, “Hey Aaron, you work here?”

“Someone has to,” he laughed awkwardly. He could feel that the other three cheerleader’s eyes were on him too, but he didn’t look away from Katelyn. 

Katelyn let out a small laugh along with him and his whole body filled with relief. “Sorry, uh, can we get 4 caramel frappés please?” She asked, pretending to look at the menu. Her nails were scary sharp and painted amber, tapping on the cardboard in feigned thought.

“Yep, sure. Anything else?” He asked, glancing at the other three girls. One of them let out a snigger that was quickly extinguished by a foot under the table. Judging from the direction of glares, it came from Katelyn.

“We’re all good here,” she said with a nod.

Aaron was quick to rush away and shout the order. When he returned with the drinks, the chatter amongst their table quietened and they all turned to look at him. Aaron’s heart stuttered with anxiety as he placed each drink down. He scarcely managed not to spill any.

Just as he was about to walk back, Katelyn chimed, “Aaron.”

He turned on his heels and looked at her, “Katelyn?” The name was uneasy on his lips, like he wasn’t allowed to say it.

“Did you get notes from Bio today? I completely overslept and missed the class,” she asked and rolled her eyes when she explained.

Aaron nodded before realising he should probably speak, “yeah, uh. I’ve got them but I don’t finish until five.”

“It’s fine, just text me pictures of them,” she said before pulling a pen from Aaron’s apron and writing her number on a napkin.

He took the napkin with a smile, his hands maybe lingering too long over Katelyn’s. The rest of his day passed a lot quicker, his smile a degree less fake when he greeted customers until he finished his shift. For once in his life, Aaron Minyard felt normal. The air felt how bubblegum tastes, sickly sweet and short-lived. The light feeling stayed with him all day.

Kevin greeted him outside the cafe with a nod. It was a Friday and the game had been cancelled so they decided they’d hang out anyway. Really, Aaron should be studying but Kevin had become a good friend- and he was getting tired of being stuck in his head 24/7. He really just wanted to hear a voice other than his own for once. 

“Katelyn gave me her number,” Aaron broke the easy silence as they pulled out of the university campus. The car screeched to a halt at Aaron’s statement.  
It should be mentioned that Kevin Day never should have been given a driver’s license. 

“I didn’t think you had the balls,” said Kevin, turning his gaze from the road to Aaron.

“You’re holding up traffic,” he noted. 

Kevin glanced around before starting the car again, “how’d you do it?”

“She gave me it, she wrote it on a napkin,” Aaron explained, pulling the napkin out of his pocket. 

Kevin gave an impressed nod, so Aaron decided he’d leave out the detail that she was asking for biology notes to save himself the embarrassment, and instead gave Kevin directions to the house. 

They pulled up outside the house and Aaron felt the sickly sweet air turn sour. He looked to Kevin, who was gaping at the building, his hands still gripping the wheel tight. His bottom lip watch twitching nervously with the urge to speak, but the only noise that came out was sharp breaths. Eventually, he found his words, “you live here?”

“Yeah… why?” Aaron’s heart was in his throat in a whole new way now, not from anxiety like how he felt around Katelyn. That was butterflies. This was a flock seagulls having a squabble in his chest. He could sense that Kevin felt the same.

Kevin gulped, “uh, you know it’s haunted?”

Aaron laughed nervously, “yeah. You believe that stuff?”

He barely managed to pull his gaze away from the house, and couldn’t bring himself to look at Aaron. So he looked out onto the road. “It was haunted well before the Wesninski’s died, let’s just say that.”

“What do you mean?” Aaron asked as he shuffled in his seat.

“The son, Nathaniel, he was supposed to join the Raven’s with me and… me and him. Like Jean, he was a payment made to the Moriyama’s. A bloody good backliner.” He said the last statement with a sick, almost nostalgic smile and a huff, before returning to his solemn tone. “Nathaniel trained with us everyday for 8 years, but the summer before freshman year… I didn’t know… that he’d die.”

Kevin was shaking uncontrollably now, eyes welling up with tears. Aaron had no idea what to do, but he could tell Kevin had been holding this all in, so he asked: “What happened?”

Kevin’s string of words was fast but barely coherent, “the Butcher, he wanted back on his deal with the Moriyama’s, he thought Nathaniel was too useful to his criminal business for Exy. Nathaniel, he didn’t agree, he wanted to go pro as much as Riko and I. A fight broke out at the Wesninski house, and that’s the story you’ll know. Stuart Hatford killing Wesninski to save him, but he was too late.” 

That’s when Kevin broke down. He threw his forehead onto the steering wheel with a muffled sob. Aaron put a cautious hand on Kevin’s shoulder, he was unfamiliar with physical comfort but he tried his best- and used his words. “Kevin, there was nothing you could have done.”

“I know that,” he cried, “All of this shit! It just happens around me, people get murdered by the dozens and we’re just supposed to keep playing! We’re supposed to pretend we don’t see the strings being pulled!”

“I’m so sorry,” was all Aaron could manage to say.

Kevin ran his hands over his face as he took a deep breath through his nose, “get out of the car.”

Aaron undid his seatbelt in compliance, “are you gonna be okay?” He asked hesitantly. 

“I’ll be fine. Just- I- I can’t go in there… not again. I’m sorry,” Kevin stumbled over his words but the only one that tripped Aaron up was _again_ because all he could wonder was how close he and Nathaniel were. For some reason, he was still looking for the missing clue in Andrew’s stupid mystery.

“I’ll see you on Monday, okay?” Aaron cocked his head in a odd sympathetic way, he hated himself for the ingenuine action. 

Kevin nodded hastily so Aaron got out of the car with the same sense of urgently. The car was bolting forward the moment Aaron slammed the car door shut. In its wake, he saw Andrew on the porch with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He gave a dry chuckle unaccompanied by a smile and heckled, “boy trouble?”


	6. THE MISSING PIECE

Andrew Minyard never forgets a face- especially when that face is branded with a number. He had walked outside into the cool October air for a cigarette and a moment to think, but he noticed a car out front. In the car was the boy from the club; same black hair, same tattoo, same fearful look- no… Worse. 

He was trembling and yelling, and Andrew could feel the energy that seeped out from the car. Like black pools trickling out of the cracks in the windows, that’s how he saw it at least. Whatever was going on, and whyever he was parked in front of Andrew’s house, it had sparked his interest. 

He saw Aaron’s head pop up from the other side of the car, looking shaken. He must have been drowning in that car, Andrew thought. He walked up towards Andrew once the car had passed him. Unamused, Andrew forced out a sharp laugh to ridicule his brother, “boy trouble?” 

“I’m not gay, Andrew,” Aaron rolled his eyes. 

Andrew just hummed and said, _he is._

“What? Did you sense it?” Aaron mocked.

“Ah, of course, I used my supernatural gaydar,” he replied dryly. Aaron didn’t respond so he decided to give him the luxury of a straight-forward answer. “He’s a regular.”

Aaron shrugged and shoved past his brother to get to the door, ignoring the statement and going inside the house. Before, the house had been creepy, now it felt personal. Knowing the kid who died was his age made his bones cold. He was just like Kevin, tortured with expectations of greatness, seen as property. He thought maybe he wanted in on Andrew’s search, he thought maybe that Nathaniel’s ghost wanted some peace instead.

His brother followed him in, not having the courtesy to put out his cigarette. Aaron hated the smell, it reminded him of Tilda’s old boyfriends, though he never mentioned that. Instead, he put up with Andrew’s habit and Andrew put up with his. Although, Aaron preferred caffeine over nicotine when it came to stimulants.

Andrew flopped himself down onto the couch, taking up the whole three seats somehow, even though he was no taller than Aaron. He smoked the cigarette like he kept forgetting it was there, having to relight it a few times. Andrew wasn’t even looking in Aaron’s direction, yet he still felt he was being watched. 

“Are you going to tell me what that was about?” Andrew asked. He was fairly perceptive (a benefit of being detached) and had already formulated a few of his own theories. He thought of Neil’s tattoo in the same place as Kevin’s - the numbers. He’d now guessed Neil couldn’t have died long ago, considering he only looked a few years younger than the boy whose tattoo his matched. Maybe the Butcher marked his property. But Kevin looked too clean cut to be involved in that life, and if he had, maybe he’d have stuck up for himself at the bar. “With Kevin.”

Aaron looked shocked that Andrew had cared to learn the guy’s name, so he reacted and spoke, “Have you found anything? Any...one?”

“Perhaps,” Andrew mused, he wouldn’t say he’d found much from Neil, but it was a start.

_Kevin was teammates- uh, friends- with the Butcher’s son,_ Aaron told him, not daring to speak of it outloud. He’d seen the struggle Kevin had trying to put this story into words, he didn’t want to hurt that.

“The numbers,” Andrew blurted out, uncharacteristic for him but something in his eyes twitched like interest. _The tattoo, how did Kevin get it?_

_Uh, his old captain Riko… Riko Moringa?_ Aaron’s brow was furrowed in thought, _Morty? Moriyama? Riko Moriyama, he has the same tattoo with the number one. Why? What’s the tattoo got to do with it?_

Andrew’s eyes looked like they were grinning, but his lips were firm against his cigarette. _Everything._ He blew out smoke as he asked, _Who do you think I found?_

“What?” Aaron muttered.

_You asked me if I had found anything, by that, do you mean you think The Butcher’s son is here?_

_I think it would make sense… to Kevin also, the way he spoke about Nathaniel. It’s like he knew it wasn’t over._

Andrew flung himself forward in the seat, letting his elbows rest on his knees. He put the cigarette out in Aaron’s coffee mug from that morning, earning him a disgusted glare. Despite his annoyance, he asked, _Do you think we should bring him here? To summon the ghost or whatever._

_He might just be the missing piece,_ Andrew thought, it was in progress and sounded like ticking in Aaron’s head, so he didn’t respond. “No. No, we should not. If he responded like that just being outside the house-”

“Wait what? Is that empathy?” Aaron choked.

“Let me finish,” Andrew snapped. “His energy was uncontrolled and heavy, we can’t bring it here, who knows what it will awake.”

“Oh, thank God,” he whispered now, before they both exchanged a thoughtful look. 

Andrew didn’t mention Aaron’s sudden interest in the topic, instead left him to get on with his homework and went upstairs to do his own research.


	7. CONFESSION

Insomnia must be genetic, because when Andrew crept out his room on restless feet that tried to tread carefully to not wake anyone, they were already up. A distant light shone from Aaron’s room. He peered across to see Aaron hunched over his desk, arms shaking as he scribbled something down. The next door was Nicky’s. It was closed, but he could hear muffled giggles and whispers, echoed on the rattle of Nicky’s cellphone.

He wandered through the dark house, letting his fingertips graze the walls as we walked. Not being able to see let him focus on the feeling he got from the place. The way the walls felt colder, like a damp kind of cold, when he got closer to the basement. It was a long shot, but he’d scared Neil off of his room. 

“Nathaniel,” he called gingerly when he walked down the stairs to the basement. His voice was raspy, so he spoke louder, “Nathaniel.”

He knew names held power, he felt its importance in his throat like a stone when he spoke it. “Nathaniel Wesninski,” he shuddered with the words - but they worked.

“Don’t call me that,” he demanded, he looked like he shouted it, but it was an echo of a shout to Andrew. He sounded like he was underwater, Andrew wanted to step closer to hear him. 

“Don’t lie to me again,” Andrew retorted. 

Nathaniel scoffed, “I don’t owe you the truth.” 

When Andrew first met the ghost, he was simply a mystery to be solved. Now, seeing Kevin’s grief had given him a strange perspective. Nathaniel had been someone; he had had friends, he had finished high school, he played _fucking Exy of all things._ Nonetheless, Andrew suspected that Neil had always been a lie, his stance was one of a boy who’d never been able to tell the truth. Closed-off, defensive, afraid. He was someone who’d been shaped by circumstance, not his own person. 

“God, you’re tragic,” he said, it wasn’t a reply. 

“What do you know about me?” Nathaniel asked, cautiously skirting around the walls of the basement.

Andrew stepped further into the room, “I know you played Exy with Kevin Day and Riko Moriyama, I know your father killed you, I know it was because he didn’t want the Moriyama’s the profit off you when you went pro.”

Nathaniel seemed to grow in presence, like Andrew’s words exposed him. He always looked afraid, now he looked actively so. He was skittish, Andrew had learned that, so he tried to diffuse the tension. “Well, the last bit I guessed. But guessing from your reaction, I’m right. Or almost there.”

Nathaniel choked, “nailed it.”

“Don’t leave, are you safe here?” 

He nodded nervously, “safer upstairs. Your room.”

“I thought that’s where you died,” Andrew thought aloud. When he looked to Nathaniel, he was glancing away awkwardly. 

“I lied,” Nathaniel admitted.

The grin that spread across Andrew’s lips was malevolent, “that’s all I wanted to hear.”

Nathaniel laughed an empty laugh that left the air just as vacant, abandoned to the silence of the house. His eyes dared to meet Andrew’s eyes that stared right back. Nathaniel let himself be seen, he indulged in the unsettling and unfamiliar feeling. He followed the feeling up the stairs.

“Nathaniel. Where did you die?” Andrew asked in a whisper as they crossed the hall. 

Nathaniel walked ahead of him, marching silently up a few steps and straight back down them. He could feel Andrew watching his every move, it was somewhere between disorientating and invigorating. He planted himself a few metres from the door and started to inspect the floor. “If you want answers, you’re going to have to stop calling me by that name.”

“Neil is not much of a nickname,” Andrew leaned against the banister as he whispered. Nathaniel chose to regard him with the same informal stance, feigning confidence. “You said that all you are is a name, why would you want to forget it?”

“Neil is what my friends called me,” Nathaniel justified. 

“Does this mean we’re friends?” Andrew chuckled spitefully.

Nathaniel shook his head, but raised it high. “It means that my given name died with the man who gave it to me, my friends live on.”

Andrew turned his head slightly to the side and nodded thoughtfully, “well, let’s not loiter. I don’t like the energy here.”

“Wonder why,” Neil sighed before flowing into motion. He bypassed Andrew and skimmed up the stairs. It wasn’t flying; it was running with no sound.

Andrew followed after Neil into the room. The moment he got through the door, it shut behind him with a small thud. “Quieter this time,” Andrew noted, as he took out a cigarette from the box on his bedside table. 

“Can I have one?” Neil blurted.

“Can you even hold one?” Andrew’s brow was furrowed in confusion, but lit two in his mouth and he handed one over.  
Neil stretched his paper thin arm out for it, “I can try.” He took it between his index finger and thumb in testing. When he asserted a grip on it, he smiled slightly. He held it close to his face, looking it up and down.

He glanced up to meet Andrew’s puzzled gaze, his small smile dropped. “I like the smell.”

“Hell, I don’t even like the smell and I smoke them,” Andrew spoke, but his face remained perplexed and his eyes still searched Neil’s. 

Neil just shrugged and waved the stick in front of him, just slow enough to not extinguish it, letting the smoke create waves in the air. Andrew watched the way his eyes twitched from the glowing ember of the tip to where Andrew stood in front of him. “So, you’re Aaron, right?”

Andrew made a disgusted noise, “try again.”

“Adrian?” Neil squinted and looked through him as if he was the ghost. Andrew shook his head and Neil breathed in sharply between his teeth in feign thought. “Anth- no… Adam?”

“Nathaniel.” Andrew warned, knowing Neil was only messing with him now.

“Fine,” he sighed, his amused look faded and he challenged Andrew with his glare again. “Andrew. Andrew Minyard.”

The name was something not old but mundane nonetheless to Andrew. Still, the use of it from Neil sent shivers down his spine that he held there. The tension knotted around him but he didn’t let it show. “Correct,” he stretched his neck side to side in attempt to shake the feeling. It worked to make him feel more at ease, but maybe it was looking into Neil’s icy blue eyes that made him shudder. 

“What do I win?” Neil joked, but Andrew gave him a serious response.

“An answer.”

Neil thought about what to ask, he wanted to keep Andrew on his toes, play this insightful game Andrew liked so much. But Neil was not who he used to be: a man who could talk his way out of anything, or destroy another’s ego with simple placements of words. It’s something that came in handy in a house full of violent criminals twice his size, but maybe it got him _in_ more trouble than out. Now, he was just a spirit with no real sense of inferiority or superiority, not someone who played these games.

“What did you do to Aaron?” He asked. Something big drove a wall between them, and they took that wall with them and placed it through the centre of his house- he wanted to know what it was.

Andrew caught his bottom lip between his teeth, “I knew you’d ask that.”

“So you want me to know?”

“No. Maybe it’s my self-destructive side... Maybe I am just an idiot,” Andrew mused. He didn’t like being this open, this easily. However (even if he was an idiot) he was not a liar. 

“You’re not sorry for it, whatever it is, so just tell me.” Neil said. Now _this_ is the man he once was.

Andrew lifted his chin and let the back of his head hit the wall, it exposed his neck in a way that made him wonder if Neil could come right up there and slit his throat. How much of him was Nathan Wesninski? Was he capable of the same horrors?

“I killed his mother,” Andrew said bluntly.

Neil’s reaction determined just how exposed to his father’s criminal life, whether he was desensitised to these dark things. “Your mother?” He asked casually. 

“His mother, I did not know her long. I grew up in foster care,” Andrew explained.

“Wait, so, you’re bond? That’s a new thing?” Neil asked, ignoring the murder topic and focusing on his and Aaron’s peculiar dynamic. Andrew noted that as perceptive, he’d realised killing Tilda wasn’t what mattered. Aaron mattered.

“It has always been with us, it is how I knew she was beating him before I ever saw it happen,” Andrew took a pause here, his tone distant but his eyes trained ahead of him. “I crashed the car, she died on impact. More than she deserved. I did it to protect him, so know now, if you plan to be a hostile threat on this house- I will find a way to take you out.”

Neil’s grin was shining bright like the edge of a knife, unsettling, but he pulled it off his face and nodded. “I did what you did.”

“Killed someone?” 

“My father.”


	8. CREEP

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey so sorry i havent updated this in a while i lost my way with it for a while but i swung it back with some neil backstory which will be in the next chapter so that should be up soon, but here's this!

Shaken by the day’s revelations, Aaron retired to his room. Trying to gain some semblance of normal life, he pulled the napkin from his pocket and delicately lay it out flat on the desk. Smiling only gave him guilt, he wanted to help Kevin somehow. He thought maybe his telepathy could help, have him contact Nathaniel, like Andrew had. But that would only reopen old wounds, he knew how that felt.

What could he do? He wasn’t the kind of supportive friend Kevin needed, as much as he wished he could be. He didn’t know what he could say to make things hurt less because he was always a realist. Facts were facts and life sucked, he ignored these facts and continued living with it. 

For years, he had justified his selfish actions because it was every man for himself. He didn’t invest himself in the wellbeing of his friends, he never got that close. He focused on keeping himself alive in that house, now he was away from her. Safe - maybe. And now a person he had come to call his friend was falling apart. And he cared but he couldn’t be strong in the way Andrew was strong, he couldn’t punch his way out, or protect Kevin physically. And he couldn’t be strong in the way Nicky was, his unwavering support and friendly pep talks.

Where could his logic get him?

He looked to the Exy racquet that was propped up against his closet. To Aaron, it was a game. It was a means to an end; a way to avoid his mother, a way to get into college, a way to keep friends. To Kevin, it held more sinister memories. Exy was something to dedicate his life to, an obligation, to keep him alive. He leaned forward to pick it up, the weight feeling unfamiliar once again. He tossed it up and down, inspecting it but thinking of anything but the game itself. 

He put it down and replaced it with his phone. Carefully he copied Katelyn’s number into his contacts. He sends her the notes she missed, silently thanking God that his handwriting wasn’t as appalling as Andrew’s. He didn’t stop looking at the screen once he sent it, but started blankly at the screen analysing it to see if he’d somehow managed to embarrass himself. Again.

**Aaron**  
[ Hi it’s Aaron, here’s the notes ] 

Her reply came the moment he looked away. 

**Katelyn**  
[ Thank you so much! xx ] 

**Aaron**  
[ Anytime ] 

[ Can you read them alright? ]

He cursed under his breath for double texting, then cursed again at himself for being so neurotic about a fucking text message. He wondered whether to reciprocate the kisses, but decided to wait and see if she used them on her next message. If she sent another.

**Katelyn**  
[ Yup, just fine dw xx ] 

**Aaron**  
[ Okay, see you Monday? xx ] 

**Katelyn**  
[ Sunday? xx ] 

**Aaron**  
[ The Jackals game on Monday, what’s Sunday? ] 

**Katelyn**  
[ Coffee at the havana java ] 

[ Is 1pm okay? ]

Aaron was about to have a small seizure. He re-read the text over and over, each time his smile creaked wider. 

He’d spent the whole of his first semester pining over her, from the moment he first passed her running down the court. She was a flash of strawberry blonde hair and dark freckles that covered her cheeks. Next was a flash of blue jersey in his face when he ran into Kevin’s chest because he wasn’t concentrating. Now he thought about it, that’s probably also the moment Kevin realised Aaron liked Katelyn.

They shared a few classes, he found out she was going on to do medicine too. She was wicked smart and confident about it. She wasn’t the first hand up to a question, but usually the first one to get it right. He was convinced she didn’t have a flaw, but now he knew.

It was her dreadful taste in men.

**Aaron**  
[ Sunday it is them :) xx ] 

The giddy feeling Katelyn gave him made his heart beat too fast in his chest, it curdled with the underlying anxiety in his stomach over Kevin and then he was staring at the man’s name on his phone screen. He was one of few contacts, as he had hardly any friends and Andrew had blocked his number after Aaron blocked his thoughts. A petty and useless retaliation. He knew he should text him and make sure he’s okay, even though he knew that he was not okay. He never knew what to say.

Andrew, by some miracle, was having an easier time knowing what to say. Trivia was always something that baffled the Minyards, the social niceties that came with friendship and dating were a complete mystery. However, in tragedy was where they worked best. And that’s what Neil was, a fucking tragedy.

“I thought Hatford killed your father?” Andrew questioned, he had suspected that was only half of the story but not that the man’s own son had killed him. Now, that interested Andrew.

“What?” Neil reacted immediately.

Andrew sat on the bed awkwardly, realising only then that his legs didn’t reach the ground when he did so, which really ruined any chance of intimidating the spirit. “That is what the official police report said,” he told Neil, who pulled an unimpressed face at this. “It said that Hatford killed your father when your father attacked you.”

“That’s not what happened, he was there. He died, that’s when I did it. He had already killed my mother, he said he was coming for the team next. He wanted back on his deal with the Moriyama’s, he wanted them to give me back. I- I was naive, I just wanted to play Exy, leave this house. Look how that worked out,” Neil said, nerves radiating off him like static. He half-expected a laugh to escape Neil’s pale lips, but he kept his eyes trained on the cigarette in his hand that he extinguished on the cold palm of his hand. Then dropped it onto the floor.

“So, you were actually part of your father’s drug ring?” Andrew asked.

Neil nodded, “why?”

“That was why he didn’t want you to join the Ravens,” he guessed. Nathan Wesninski didn’t seem like the kind of loving father who didn’t want his son involved with the branch Moriyamas for his safety. “You were a valuable asset to him.”

“Yes.”

“Your father was an idiot,” Andrew sighed with his words.

“You’re not wrong,” Neil agreed, trying to lighten the words.

“I never am, Neil.” Andrew let out a sigh with his words. “So, if you killed the Butcher- how did you die?”

Neil pursed his lips, huffing out of his nose. Andrew noticed the way he hunched when he thought about it, his hand hovering in the air, unsure. He lifted his shirt. At first, Andrew was surprised there was torso underneath the billowing t-shirt. Then he saw the gleam of a fresh-looking bloody cut that sliced up from his bottom rib to the base of his neck.  
He let his eyes look away, to Neil’s eyes, which were hooded by his eyelids as he looked down at himself. He dropped the shirt back down and regained his composure. “Um-” Andrew started, hands twitching in the same way Neil’s had. He’d not been this lost for words since he found his voice.

“I bled out in the hall, next to my father- I watched him die,” Neil said, cold and still.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading!! please comment and kudos if u liked it, and if u didnt like it still comment and tell me why


	9. BIRTHDAY BONUS

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is just a fun little chapter in honour of me and my brothers birthday, its /terribly written and completely irrelevant but whatever

Andrew realised it was his birthday when he checked his phone as he wandered out of the club at ridiculous o’clock in the morning, he looked at the date in confusion. He wondered where the time had gone, but the cold winter air that was coming in reminded him. After slipping his phone back into his pocket he wrapped his coat closer to him as he made his way to the car. 

Later that morning, Aaron woke lazily. He slapped the wood of his bedside table in search of his phone. It was 11:34 am, November 4th. Most importantly, it was a Saturday so he didn’t have class. He threw his head down onto the pillow, but didn’t sleep. It was rare he ever got more than four hours sleep, by habit his body didn’t let him fall back to sleep. 

Instead, he dragged himself up and went to fix himself breakfast. Andrew was already up, well, he hadn’t slept. Aaron asked himself whether it was ruder to ignore him on his birthday, or specifically choose only to talk to him today. He decided ignoring Andrew would be a gift to himself. 

It was never up to Aaron, though. 

“It’s your birthday,” was all Andrew said. 

Aaron guessed this was the best ‘happy birthday’ he could manage, so he nodded and replied, “yours too.”

“That is how it works,” he mirrored Aaron’s nod. And that was it.

Nicky fell through the door at around eight in the evening. He was cradling 4 plastic bags, tripping over each as he walked. “Andrew, where’s your other half?”  
Andrew frowned and tapped up his right leg, then did the same to his right. “...Hm, no. I am all here- intact.” He said sarcastically, and Nicky sighed a sigh that would have been a laugh if he wasn’t carrying his own weight in groceries. 

“You know what I mean,” Nicky groaned, letting the bags drop onto the coffee table. 

_Aaron, Nicky wants you,_ he called.

_Busy,_ was his automatic response, but it was less of a reply and more of a feeling- like he hung up on their supernatural phone call. So Andrew left a message after the beep. 

_No, you’re not._

He didn’t receive another response but Aaron appeared in the room a few minutes later, “what do you want?”

“I was wondering since neither of you are working tonight, we could watch a movie,” Nicky smiled easily.

“You’re not tricking us into having a birthday party,” said Aaron flatly.

Nicky groaned, “you’re both cynics. Guess I spent all this money on snacks and booze for nothing.”

“You had me at snacks,” Andrew shrugged. Aaron looked at him accusingly, as if their outward disinterest in each other’s lives was something they had promised each other, maybe they had. Nonetheless, Andrew knew Aaron would only be upstairs torturing himself over homework if he wasn’t with him and Nicky. 

“Perfect,” Nicky let out a full grin now, “Aaron?” 

Aaron sighed, which meant he agreed, or more so given up. The living room was a huge thing, so Andrew kept himself apart on the armchair in the corner that sat next to the landline they didn’t use. And Nicky and Aaron sat at opposite ends of the couch. As the movie played, the table became littered with bottles and bowls. 

Nicky disappeared into the kitchen and reappeared with two cartons of ice cream, each with a lit candle stuck in. He set them down on the table and burst into singing happy birthday. Across the room, the twins made pleading eye-contact. 

Halfway through the song, Andrew’s voice cut through Nicky’s croaking, “You know, it’s really sad when there are more people whose birthday it is than people singing?” He pursed his lips and looked at Nicky.

Aaron leaned over and blew out his candle, making Nicky whip his head around to look at him in dismay. Andrew made a jarring noise that would have been a laugh. “I wasn’t even done singing!” Nicky whined, but he’d always let himself be the butt of the joke if it meant the twins were joking. “Whatever.”

During the last half an hour of the movie, Aaron’s phone lit up the entire room as he typed on it furiously. The flickering light was beginning to itch Andrew, so he decided best to make a rude comment. “How’s the boyfriend?” 

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Aaron replied without looking up from the screen, “one gay cousin per family, sorry.” 

“Who’s Aaron’s boyfriend?” Nicky looked to Andrew, who declined to comment. 

Aaron finally put his phone down, “he’s my teammate, not my boyfriend.”

“Oooh, cool, can I have him?” Nicky laughed. 

“He is a regular, I could get you his number,” Andrew added. He was never going to do that, but saying it clearly annoyed Aaron. 

Nicky played along, “also, teammate? He plays Exy? Is he buff?”

“Oh my god,” Aaron muttered.

“We’re just messing with you. Keep him.”

This left an awkward air to the room, Andrew had a few dirty glances sent his way by Aaron but ignored them. The movie finished and Andrew was no longer obliged to spend time with his family. With a sigh of relief, he hauled himself up to his room to pass out for the first time in days. 

When he closed the door behind him, he caught a glimpse of translucent arms. “No,” he deadpanned.

“Huh?” Neil echoed, not quite there visually.

“I’m not dealing with this spooky shit tonight, no,” he grumbled, pulling off his shoes and throwing them carelessly in Neil’s general direction.

Neil frowned, kicking the shoe. “Happy birthday,” he shrugged. Andrew didn’t like knowing that Neil was listening, he got the impression that Neil knew more than he let on. He’d rather tell Neil these things about himself in exchange for more information of Nathan Wesninski. 

Andrew bit his lip as he watched Neil leave, not quite sure he wanted him too. There was something comforting oddly comforting about his presence, something true, something real. Sometimes Andrew felt like the world wasn’t real, like he just spectated these orchestrated events in life that he was supposed to pretend surprised him. There was something undeniable about Neil, he was as true as death, when he stopped lying.


	10. PSYCHO (PART 1)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this is neils flashback from what he was talking about with andrew in chapter 8 so technically it should be chapter 9 so im might delete the birthday chapter. anyway, enjoy! pls comment and kudos

The house felt like blood was raining from the ceiling, more than usual. The stench was already ingrained in the floorboards downstairs, no matter how much Mary tried to bleach it away. No matter how much she tried to hide her husband’s crimes, the smell still clung to the air. But now, Neil could feel it pouring down the walls, dripping across his fingers, staining everything he owned. The only thing untainted with red was the black Exy jersey that lay strewn on his bed. 

He picked it up and put it in his duffel bag. Along with his racquet, his sneakers, a road map and a beretta. He threw it off the bed in frustration. Running away was unthinkable, laughable even. As much as he wished he could leave his life in Baltimore, it was a pipedream. 

Exy was his way out. It was always the only thing that made sense to him, _somehow_ one of the less violent things in his life. And, it could get him to Edgar Allen University, away from his father. He could train with Kevin and Jean, and Riko, and forget the wrong he’d done under his father’s wing. He wouldn’t be The Butcher, he could stop hurting people now. He could be Neil Wesninski- #4 backliner for the Edgar Allen Ravens. 

He wasn’t like his father. He wasn’t a tyrant, or a sadist, he wasn’t somebody’s tool. 

Ten hours ago, he was supposed to leave for West Virginia to start summer practises. His father had refused to let him out of the door, told him he needed help getting information out of a particularly resistant man. This was a lie, Nathan could have handled the man himself. Actually, it was a power move, he wanted to show Neil his criminal worth. 

“Nathaniel,” he said the name as if he’d just dropped it on the floor, every time. He leaned down to take the racquet that was resting in between the straps of Neil’s duffel. Neil’s fists clenched but he didn’t stop him. “Is Exy really a good use of your talents?” He tossed the thing in his hand and looked down at it with an unimpressed look.

The word _talents_ scratched at Neil’s brain, he didn’t see knowing how to slice a man’s leg apart a tendon at a time as a talent. 

“The Moriyama’s will realise your much more use to them as a… interrogator,” the last word satisfied him, a sick smile stretching his mouth. A smile he was used to seeing in the shining reflection of a cleaver, rather than face to face. More and more, he caught glimpses of this smile in the mirror. It made his stomach churn. 

“Dad,” he said the word as if he’d never heard it, every time. “Is this really the best idea? The Moriyama’s are dangerous people.”

“You think I don’t know that, insolent child,” he seethed, “I thought I raised you better.”

Neil was not an insolent child, he was an insolent adult. If Nathan wanted him to follow in his footsteps, he’d better get used to hearing his opinions. “Don’t you think they’ll see this as insubordination on your behalf?”

This made Nathan angry, but not in the way he’d been angry at Neil as a child. It wasn’t senseless, misdirected rage at a small misdemeanor. It wasn’t something he could take out on Mary instead. It was precisely placed words that made him question himself. The words that dug him in the ribs. Neil’s sharp tongue was his best talent, and his fatal flaw.

“They’re making a mistake,” he said, calm and collected. 

Stuart turned the corner to the hall to see their confrontation. He made a face at Neil as if to ask him what was going on. Neil understood why Nathan called him a busybody now, but he’d guessed it was just habit from keeping his ear to the ground in London. He had a polite demeanor but it made him no less dangerous. He was Neil’s closest ally when he visited the Wesninski household.

“Nathan. He’s not talking but he is going to bleed out, do you want Lola to patch him up first?” Stuart tried to diffuse the conversation by focusing on the task at hand. 

The Butcher groaned, “I didn’t hit anything major he’ll be fine.”

“Actually, you hit an artery in his foot as well, combined with the ones on his chest and arms. It’s very possible he’ll bleed out.” Neil observed, remembering the way the blood spurted out of a man’s foot when he tried to squirm away from the Butcher. 

Nathan Wesninski did not like being told he was wrong. 

“Go do it yourself then, Nathaniel. Tell Lola she’s got the afternoon off,” Nathan said before inhaling deeply. “Maybe your poor first aid skills will make you realise you were made to maim and kill, not anything else. Not Exy.” He said these words threateningly, but this was his nicer side. The punishment wasn’t violent, or physical, just a morbid task he’d add to his list of errands. 

Neil nodded and scuttled down the basement. The man was laying there, his tears dragged down the blood left on his face and dried. It left horrible streaks of burgundy down his face. The tattoos on his chest and arms were torn up with open wounds. He noted the tiny organised rows of papercuts that multiplied to spread up his ribs and over his shoulder, it was Lola’s torturing handiwork. The larger slashes had come from Nathan’s initial rage, they were scattered up from his feet to his stomach, just enough to get him on the ground. The others were across his cheek and up his forearm. 

He was hardly conscious, eyes to black to open. But he still wasn’t talking. “Dupont, right?” He asked. Originally, they were always shocked to hear a child’s voice in the basement. Lola said that’s what made Neil scary. “We hear you’ve got something to tell us?”

“I-” his voice cut from blood in his throat, “I’m not telling you any- thing. You- will have to k-kill me,” he croaked out his words of defiance.

Neil sighed, “that’s the thing. You know how this works, we’re not going to kill you, yet. You might think this means you’re worth something, you are not. You’re a means to an end, James, and you’re not going to survive this. So, why should a man with nothing to lose keep secrets?”

He muttered something like honour and Neil rolled his eyes. He walked around the table syrupy slow, letting Dupont hear each footstep. He took out a plain black box filled with bandages and antiseptic. He dabbed antiseptic onto the man’s wounds, watching him wince. Then he wrapped up the gash on his foot and the slice across his chest. Dupont was breathing heavily now, realising his torment was far from over. 

“I’ll give you some time to think, but The Butcher’s on his way.” He taunted before going back up the stairs. He made a stop at the bathroom to watch his hands of blood, his head down as not to meet the mirror. 

When he turned he saw Lola in the doorway, her usual wide smile suppressed barely. “Natey matey,” she chimed at him. The nickname was ridiculous, but at least she didn’t call him Junior. 

“I thought Nathan gave you the afternoon off,” Neil muttered, drying his hands and trying to walk past her.

“Yeah, he did. I thought we could hang out like we used to,” she let the grin out now, turning to lean her back against the doorway and look up at Neil. 

Neil raised an eyebrow, “Training? You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, Lola.”

“You’re an old dog now?” She asked, cocking her head to the side. 

“You know what I mean,” he slid past the door and headed to his room. 

Lola chased him playfully. Her manic manner made Neil uncomfortable, as did her complete disregard for personal space. “What do you want?”

“You to stay,” she pushed her shoulders back in a strange demanding way, before reached her hand out to push a hair out of Neil’s eyes, glancing at the tattoo on his face disapprovingly. “You’re not a Moriyama, you’re a Wesninski. That shit on your face means nothing compared to the blood in your veins.”

“And you’re a Malcom but you’re still a fuck-up,” Neil retorted bluntly, his tone flat and disinterested. He was unaffected by the cold hand on his temple. “And no matter what I do, the Moriyama’s will still own me. I’d rather be owned of a 7 figure salary.” The last part was a lie, it wasn’t the money, it was the freedom. But Lola wouldn't buy that.

“Don’t let your dad hear that, you know he wont like to be called property,” Lola warned.

Neil should have bitten his tongue, but instead he swatted Lola’s hand away and said, “That’s what he is. It’s what we all are.”

“Nathaniel,” she dragged out his name this time pleading instead of taunting.

Neil walked away, and thankfully Lola didn’t follow this time. When he got to the top of the staircase, Nathan was towering over the landing. He grabbed Neil’s collar and yanked him up the last step, pivoting to throw his thin frame into the wall. Neil choked on the trapped breath in his chest, the blow shattered through his back. 

“Don’t you realise, Junior? Riko wasn’t cut out for this life, nor was Tetsuji- but you,” he let his grip loosen enough for Neil’s feet to make solid contact with the ground again, but relented to holding him back. “You. You were born to do this.” 

Neil scoffed, a small act of defiance but it was all he could muster. He felt like a child again, he felt helpless; surrounded. He was powerless against his father physically, and his words wouldn’t save him. “You being childish and naive,” he said, as if he had read Neil’s mind. “It’s just a game, it won’t change who you are or what you’ve done. If the Moriyama’s come for you, then I’ll let them take you. But face it, they don’t want you that badly.”

“Kevin does, he can change Riko’s mind.”

This made Nathan laugh out-loud, “you children think you have any kind of sway when it comes to the main branch Moriyamas. Don’t be so stupid.”

He was right. When Neil was with his friends he understood how Nathan saw them, young and foolish. He felt split down the middle. Torn between living his youth in blissful ignorance with his friends, or going down his father’s path. He had to leave the child he was behind. “I’m sorry,” he muttered in strained breaths. “You’re right.” The words tasted bitter on his tongue, it was the cowering submission he thought that he would leave behind.

Nathan released his grip, “Good. We’ve got some business in the basement after dinner, time to realise your potential.” He informed Neil, then stepped back to let him hurry away to his room.


	11. KILLER (PART 2)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's part 2 of neils flashback, im sorry in advance

Neil saw a screen full of texts and missed calls on his bed, he picked up the phone and scrolled through them.

 **Riko**  
[ You’re late. ]

 **Kevin**  
[ Where are u????? ]  
[ Ur going to miss practice ]  
[ Neil ]  
[ Neeeeiil ]  
[ U missed practice ]  
[ We got our rooms, ur cool with rooming with jean, right? ]  
[ Dude ]

 **Jean**  
[ Are you okay? ]

Looking at the texts made his heart sink, a sad smile crept onto his lips. He was feeling nostalgic for a life he was living only a matter of days ago. Part of him hoped the Moriyamas would come for him, but it would also put his family in danger. Maybe it was better if he meant nothing. 

He clicked off the texts, abandoning his phone on his desk to die so he wouldn’t have to hear from Kevin, he was dreading missing him. He was his closest friend. Riko and Neil shared a work ethic and Exy obsession. Jean and him shared a dry, cynical sense of humour and a language. Him and Kevin, they shared everything. They were one and the same- maybe they clashed sometimes, but that was because Neil was the only one Kevin would trust to give him the truth. 

Kevin had been the one to warn Neil against defying the Moriyamas, the one who told him to disobey his father, the one who told him that Exy was the path to take. Back then, he thought he had no choice anyway, but now his father wanted to keep him, go back on his deal. He wondered whether Nathan would pay them off first or wait until they took him. 

Neil tried to push all thoughts of Kevin away, all through dinner he kept catching himself thinking about what it would be like at Castle Evermore, practising everyday and sharing a room with Jean. He replaced the thoughts with ones about the man in the basement, and how he was supposed to get the information out of him? He had guessed that was what his father wanted him to do tonight, to prove himself. It put him off his food.

A loud knock on the door shattered through the house, followed by a heavy, long exhale from Nathan’s nose. He set his cutlery down begrudgingly, and stood up. Neil tapped his feet nervously on the hardwood floor. Realistically, the knock could have been from any brute that Nathan had enraged, but Neil just wasn’t that lucky. He hated it; he hated the aggressive tones, he hated the sound of gunshots, he hated his life. 

“Neil,” Mary said lowly, “Go quietly, even if your father won’t.” He knew it must be bad, if his mother was daring to defy his father. It must be the end. Her expression was hardened, fists clenched but eyes flickering. All he could do was nod.

There was a brief moment of silence before a gunshot, Neil jerked into action. “Mom, please get to the basement. Run, hide, whatever. This isn’t your battle,” Neil pleaded.

“When have I not protected you, Nathaniel? I’m not going to stop now,” Mary stood her ground, at the complete wrong time. Neil wished she’d stood up like this to his father before… actually, no, no he didn’t. 

Stuart put a hand out to Neil and muttered, “don’t worry, I’ve got her.” 

Neil nodded grimly with a hard gulp before leaving to assess the carnage. 

“-if Tetsuji wants him, he can come get him himself,” Nathan grunted into the man’s face, knife pointed sleekly against his throat. 

“This is below his pay-grade, Wesninski, don’t flatter yourself,” he replied, a sick grin shining in his blood-coated teeth.

Neil would have laughed- the man spoke to his father in the way his father had spoken to him. Then, he received a sharp knee in the stomach from Nathan. He recoiled and groaned. “Dad!” Neil yelled. Nathan’s head whipped around, blue eyes almost white- hollow. “Are you out of your mind? He’s going to kill us for this!”

Nathan turned back to the man, pushing the knife closer into his neck. It wasn’t enough to break skin, but a fair warning. “He’s right,” choked the man, cut off by a quick slice across his throat. Blood spurted out onto Nathan’s chest, it was messy and slow. And frankly, Neil thought, unnecessary and overdramatic.

“Regretting this yet?” Neil smirked, “You know you can’t go back now.”

He received a hard blow to this side of his face from Nathan’s fist, before crumpling to the ground. It echoed in his skull more than a gunshot, sending him dizzy. He heaved out breaths as he dragged himself upwards. His mouth was filled with blood now, his entire left side of his head throbbed. Getting up was a bad idea, as always. Nathan swung his leg up to smash Neil’s chin up with his boot. Neil was flung back, back of his head hitting the floor. 

“The only thing I’m regretting right now is conceiving you,” he grumbled, stepping over Neil’s body to make his way back to the dining room. 

Neil stayed lying down until the room faded back from black. He heard voices from behind him. “No!” his mother’s voice croaked, “You can’t just kill him, are you mad? You made the decision, now own it.” 

He wanted to protest, tell his mother to stand down because he knew where it would get her. He struggled upwards, stumbling into the wall as he tried to follow after his father’s voice, which boomed and rattled in his head. Then the voice stopped, he raced forward to see the scuffle.

Mary was on the floor, half stood, cowering. She was holding her hand over her eye, watery with fear. Neil’s whole heart burned with anger. Maybe anger, maybe courage, because the only thing stopping him from lurching across the room was Stuart’s warning glance from Nathan to Neil. He looked urgently back- he needed to do something. Did his mother do anything when he was cowering in fear from his father? No. Could she? No.

Could Neil?

He could try.

“Stop!” He tried to shout, but it came out as a beg. “Don’t take this out on her, I’m right here.” 

Nathan laughed, “Aren’t you just the hero of the hour?” He stepped closer to Neil, sliding his hand across the table to grab the steak knife he’d left there earlier. Neil glanced from it to Nathan’s eyes. The same as his own; a cold shade of blue. Neil’s hands were shaking, he tightened them into fists, trying not to show how afraid he was. “You wanna show me why I keep you around?” 

Neil reacted on impulse, swinging to punch his father in the stomach with all the strength he had. Then he threw another into his jaw. Neil was not strong, but he was damn quick. The world went blank, he was giving hits twice as much as he was taking them, but each blow threatened to crack his ribs. His jaw and nose were definitely already gone.

He reached for the knife that he kept in his sleeve. _This is why you keep me around._ He jabbed it into Nathan’s stomach. _This is everything you taught me to be._ It was a bold move, but also meant he wasn’t guarding his face. _This is all your fault._ Nathan reacted with a devastating punch to Neil’s temple. He fell into the wall, his legs abandoning him. 

It seemed Stuart had decided it was time to intervene, he tried to wrench Nathan off of Neil. His arms were flying into Neil’s stomach still, even when Stuart pulled him away. Nathan pulled himself free and planted his knife into Stuart’s chest solidly. He choked as Nathan twisted the knife in and pulled it back out.

Neil’s heart jumped. This was too much. He’d seen his father kill people, but they weren’t _his_ people. His feet reacted while his mind raced. He staggered up and tried to make his way to the door. 

But Nathan grabbed him by the back of his collar before his hand reached the doorknob. Neil choked. Nathan didn’t hesitate to stab Neil, he sliced all the way up to Neil’s neck. Neil was faint, he was dying. This was dying. This was how every single one of them had felt. He threw his arm up wildly, hoping. The knife pierced straight through Nathan’s jugular. His last act of defiance. 

In less than 30 seconds, both Wesninski men were dead. In less than 20 minutes, Mary died from internal bleeding. In less than an hour, a hoard of Moriyama henchmen looted the house. It took over 2 hours for the police to be alerted. It took Neil only the hour to realise why he was still there.

He looked down at his own lifeless bloodied body, the sight made his whole body lurched upwards, like he was going to vomit. Nothing came out. He couldn’t bear to see his family’s bodies carried away. He went down to the basement. His face contorted into a sob, but nothing came out. He screamed and screamed and screamed but it didn’t make anything feel okay. He lay there on the bloodied basement floor, shaking.

It took Neil 2 years to find out he wouldn’t always be so alone.


	12. MOTH TO FLAME

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey dudes!! i was really starting to miss aaron so heres this

It was Sunday at 12:53 PM, and Aaron was early. He stood outside the coffee shop to wait for Katelyn, checking the time every 30 seconds. At exactly 1:00PM, Katelyn pulled up outside the coffee shop. She was dressed in light blue jeans and a tight leather jacket that had a thick scarf tumbling over the top. It hid the bottom half of her face, but Aaron could catch the top half of her smile.

“Hey,” he greeted. 

“Hey, I didn’t think you’d show,” she replied, pulling the scarf away from her face. 

Aaron knitted his eyebrows, “why not?” 

Katelyn laughed at herself, “I was a bit forward.”

“Someone has to be,” Aaron said. It was true, he wasn’t planning to do anything but pine. He really couldn’t, Andrew would go mad if he found out that Aaron was seeing a girl. He didn’t need to know.

“Right,” she sighed at the end of her laughter, “shall we go in?”

Aaron jumped to open the door for her, “yeah.” 

She made a sarcastic comment about him being a gentlemen as they took their seat in a booth by the window. The sun was low in the sky and the windows blurred it when it spread across Katelyn’s face. It was a good light for her, she glowed, Aaron thought unwillingly. It did, however, do nothing to illuminate her dark brown eyes. They were almost a deep shade of black and Aaron was sure if he fell into them that he’d never climb back out.

“So, why here instead of on-campus?” Aaron asked.

“It’s too busy, plus you work there.” Katelyn said as she pulled her hair out from her jacket and tried to smooth it down. “This is where I come to study. No distractions.”

“Am I a distraction?” Aaron joked.

“All too often.”

Aaron’s heart was beating out of his chest. Sure, she wouldn’t have invited him here if she didn’t like him. But he couldn’t be sure. Her stating that he was a distraction made him feel warm and wanted.

They ordered their coffee and spoke easily about their classes. Aaron watched her complain. She threw her hands in the air animatedly as she ranted about their incompetent professor. Aaron nodded and laughed quietly. He rested on forearm across the table and drank his coffee with the other hand. 

Eventually, their hands edged a little closer. Their fingertips touched. Aaron looked up at Katelyn, a little panicked. She smiled sweetly and took his hand in hers. She ran her fingers over his knuckles before turning his hands his palm was facing up.

She traced the creases in his hand with the tip of her fingernail, tickling him slightly. “What are you doing?” He asked softly, not bothered with the sensation, just curious.

“Are you a twin?” She asked abruptly. Aaron’s stomach dropped, she knew Andrew? He was starting to worry he hadn’t made any friends that Andrew hadn’t already bumped into. He wasn’t sure why, but was sure it was something to do with his quest to ruin Andrew’s life.

“Yeah, why? Have you met him?” He asked.

“No, I guessed,” she replied, pulling out his fingers flat to the table. Aaron squinted in confusion. “You’ve got a double life line,” she explained, running her nail in a curve from between his index finger and thumb down to his wrist, right inbetween the lines.

“Huh?” He leaned forward to look at his own hand. There were indeed two life lines. “What else does my hand tell you?” He asked, still leant forward. Their heads close over the table, dangerously so.

“Head line across your whole palm, means you’re focused.” She raised her eyebrows at him in question, he shrugged and nodded. 

“You haven’t got an intuition line, unless,” she trailed off, showing him the line on the side of her own hand.

She took his other hand too, he let her pull his arm across the table easily. She wasn’t at all afraid to touch him, it made Aaron realised he’d not been touched without malicious intent in a very long time. 

“Only on the left, which signifies repressed psychic ability.”

“Are you psychic?” Aaron blurted out. 

Katelyn pursed her lips, “Yes… maybe. Do you believe in it?”

He smiled nervously. The intuition line was right, he did ignore his abilities, more recently than ever before. He was trying to be normal, like the rest of his team at college. His bond with Andrew wasn’t going to get him anywhere, only get in the way. Knowing Katelyn was somewhat like him reassured him. He wondered if that’s why he was so attracted to her initially.

“Yes... maybe,” he said. He was living proof of the supernatural, but it didn’t mean he wasn’t skeptic sometimes. 

She placed her hand over his now. He took a deep breath, “Do you believe in telepathy?”

“Depends how you mean; reading minds? No. Communication above speech? Probably. On some level we must be able to communicate without language, just to what extent?”

Aaron liked the way she spoke, it was animated and engaging, it was from thought to speech so quick it couldn’t be anything but 100% truth. “What about twin-telepathy?”

“It’s a cool, sci-fi kind of trope. And I think there’s more basis for it than just one person being able to read everyone’s mind, more to do with a strong bond formed over time. Are you and your twin telepaths?” She rambled before asking, genuinely intrigued.

“Yeah, if that’s what it’s called. We can talk in our heads.” Aaron shrugged.

Katelyn’s jaw dropped, and she sat back into her seat, launching into another ramble. Aaron smiled affectionately. “that’s so cool! Oh my god. I’ve tried my hand at tarot cards, palmistry, tea leaves, numerology, astrology. Everything. Looking for proof that it’s real, not just an age-old scam. But, I can never believe myself. But you, you can actually… So cool.”

Aaron chuckled awkwardly, “thanks? I think?”

As with everything, Katelyn had clearly done her research. She looked over at him as she took another sip of her coffee. He didn’t want to make this about Andrew’s ghost hunt, he wanted a life to himself like he used to have. As normal as he could get. But Katelyn was a genius, with a a sense for the supernatural.

“Have you ever seen a ghost?” He asked.

Katelyn’s smile only faded then. “Once, I think,” she started, voice quiet and eyes down. “I was young. It was my grandpa, sat in his old chair. Just… smiling.” Aaron nodded, reaching across the table again. She took his hand, “Oh, it’s fine. It’s just an old thought, not a sad one.”

He dared to lace his fingers in hers. Their hands were raised up like their were going to arm wrestle. The conversation moved on to talking about tomorrow’s game. But now it seemed petty and too much like small talk, because Aaron couldn’t stop thinking about the slamming doors, or dark cloudy energy in the house, or the twin lines across his palm.


	13. FUEL TO FIRE

Neil’s confession to Andrew, for lack of a better word, was haunting him. He couldn’t shake the sight of the bloody unhealed wound of his stomach. Andrew had his own scars, but he was healing, moving on. Neil had no choice to heal, to move on, to get away from the reminders of that life. The idea of it made Andrew feel trapped.

The house was getting to him, and Neil was nowhere to be found. So he decided to get out. It was after dawn and the suburban neighbourhood was waking up. He paced down the road as quick as he could, his neighbours had all noticed someone had moved into the Butcher’s house, and it was too early for hushed suburban curiosity and speculation.

He lit a cigarette and smoked it as he walked, his heavy breaths trailing behind him. The neatly placed identical houses faded into a greener scenery. It had the capacity to be beautiful, but all he could see was screeching tire marks and rattling disposed medicine bottles that weren’t there.

The rusty metal gate whined as he opened it, before he stepped into the graveyard. It was sheltered with trees and littered with benches as well as headstones. It was not a good place for a telepath to be. He could feel every sad story ended too soon echoing in between the stones. He systematically walked past each row, scanning names.

The ghost thing was relatively new. As far as he had known, his bond with Aaron was as far as his powers went. Maybe the glimpses he’d see were just hallucinations, he didn’t want to believe that, because Neil was real… Probably. He wondered if Nicky would be able see Neil if he let him, or was it just Andrew? He let his eyes wander around the rest of the graveyard, there were no other ghosts. That he could see, at least. He sighed in futility. 

His feet stopped not when he read Neil’s name, but when he saw a man sat in front of one of the headstones. He stood as still as possible, as if trying not to startle a bird. He was shaking. It could easily have been from the cold as he was sat on the damp grass, but it wasn’t. He shook as he spoke, his head falling down as he let out sobs. 

Andrew was not good with crying.

Andrew hadn’t cried in years.

But he needed to know.

He stepped forward.

Kevin’s head darted in his direction quick enough to break his neck, he let out a sigh. Not of relief, or disdain, just realisation. He pursed his lips. Andrew looked at the ground hesitantly before sitting himself down next to Kevin. 

He looked at the headstone. Nathaniel Abram Wesninski. January 19 1997 - May 29 2015. It felt artificial, he’d only spoken to Neil a matter of hours ago, but he’d been dead for two years. Kevin, sitting right next to him, had not spoken to him in two years. 

“Why are you here?” Kevin asked bitterly. 

Andrew thought about telling him; about Neil’s ghost, about his story of his last act of defiance, about the way his voice still cracked when he said Kevin’s name. He didn’t. That was the closest Andrew would get to compassion.

“Morning walk,” Andrew offered.

“I’m here every morning, you’re lying,” Kevin said. Well, he might not have said _you’re lying_ but it’s what he meant. Andrew however was hung up on the words _every morning._ “You live in his house.”

Andrew nodded.

Kevin sniffled loudly, “how?”

Naturally, he took a luxurious amount of time to respond, but not for lack of caring. He didn’t know how to respond. How could he tell Kevin why he really pushed for them to buy the house? It would kill him. He imagined how Kevin would feel seeing the bloody cut that ran up Neil’s chest. 

He took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, pulled one out and lit it. He took a deep drag of it and spoke, “it was not personal.”

Andrew noticed Kevin’s eyes flutter closed as inhaled through his nose. It reminded him of Neil holding his cigarettes to his face, _did the smell remind him of Neil?_

“Tell me about him,” Andrew asked. He didn’t phrase it as a question but he didn’t think Kevin would dignify him with an answer.

“Why would you want to hear it?” 

Andrew took another drag, “I’ve heard the stories.”

“That’s not an answer,” Kevin said, his voice was a little stronger now. Andrew could feel tension rising in him, ready to snap at him. He wasn’t afraid, more curious to see how long it would take.

“Do you want to talk about him?”

“Not to you. What? Do yo- do you think I owe you something for getting that dude of my ass? Well thank-fucking-you, but I can look after myself, and grieve on my own.” Kevin spat. “I don’t need someone to take pity on me because my friend died, get the fuck away from me.”

“Ke-”

“No. No, no, you don’t know what you’re getting into here,” Kevin said through sharp breathes.

“I do, I know what happened.”

He should not have said that.

“You don’t know! Whatever you’ve read it’s not what happened, it wasn’t like that. That wasn’t the life he wanted,” he broke down into sobs. 

“I know he did bad things for his father, I know that he thought joining the Ravens was the closest he would get to an escape from that.” Andrew stated, trying to hold back the rest of it. _I know he’s a pathological liar, I know he avoids talking about himself like the plague, I know he bites his bottom lip when he smiles, I know he likes the smell of cigarette smoke and I know he misses you._

Kevin sniffled, his breath shuddering in and out. Angry but weak. “Please leave.” He ordered, trying to be calm.

Andrew stood up, pulled out his packet of cigarettes and tossed them onto the grave. He wasn’t sure whether Kevin would think he was just being offensive, or see what Andrew was implying. He knew Neil, that he didn’t exactly smoke but loved the smell. He knew that from the nicotine stained walls of his room, and the way he held the cigarette in front of his nose. He wished he could tell Kevin that.

Kevin wasn’t sure which one it was, because when Neil was alive, no one knew he smoked. Riko would have had his head on a pike for risking his career for a stupid habit, and God knows what the Master would think. It spoke for Neil’s rebellious side, and made Kevin remember the way his heart skipped when he knew Neil was about to do something insolent.

Andrew stopped. He shouldn’t have ever gotten involved with Kevin, he knew Neil now and knew that Kevin wouldn’t be able to know Neil again. Sure, he could poke at Aaron to get him to accept Tilda’s death. But that was different, Aaron was his brother, and he didn’t even know this boy. He was getting uncomfortably involved.

He wondered what Neil would think of him talking to Kevin, but thought that maybe he’d want to contact him, and that would break Kevin. Maybe it’s what Neil needed, for closure. He decided he needed to know more before he went around making assumptions like that, so he returned home.


	14. FIND ME

As far as Mondays go, Aaron was having a good one. Yesterday, he had had his date with Katelyn. That evening, he felt as if he had a new outlook on the world, believed the supernatural to be far less malicious than how it had treated him. In the morning, he woke up having slept almost 5 whole hours (a record for the month). His classes had gone quick and well.

This was all until he stepped into the locker room. Abruptly, he was thrown into the tile wall behind him. “What the fuck is your brother’s issue?!” hissed Kevin, holding Aaron’s shoulder to the wall with the tips of his fingers.

_Andrew,_ he seethed, probably with enough relentless irritation that his twin brother would have heard it from the house. Of course, Andrew had spoken to Kevin. He had no respect for people’s grief, and never knew what was stepping too far. 

“Fuck,” he choked out before forming an apology, and a lie. “Look, I’m so sorry. He was lying, he’s mentally ill… I think it’s a delusion; ghosts and all.”

“He’s an asshole that’s what he i- ghosts?” Kevin stopped mid-sentence to narrow his eyes at Aaron. Kevin shuffled his feet, fingers pressing harder on Aaron’s shoulder. Aaron shut his mouth. “Not fucking ghosts, he’s got some weird obsession with me and the Perfect Court. I don’t know what it is, but he asked me about Neil. What did you tell him?!”

Aaron stuttered, “Kevin. I’m sorry about him, can we please talk after practise?” He tried to mediate- it wasn’t really his thing, he prefered just avoiding the conflict altogether.

“Fuck you!” He pushed himself away from Aaron. “Why did you tell him?” 

Begrudgingly, he summoned every bit of Andrew he had in him. He grasped Kevin’s wrist to stop him from walking away, and spoke as firmly as he could. He looked into his eyes with all the sincerity he had as he said: “Kevin, this is beyond both of us. And I’m sorry that I told him, and I’m sorry but this means you’re involved now. There’s more to it than you know. But, for the love of God, just play the game and I’ll explain later.”

“Don’t fucking tell me ghosts,” Kevin almost laughed. “What is wrong with you?”

“He’s crazy, that’s all you need to know for now,” Aaron assured him, it wasn’t a lie.

Kevin looked pale, with dark blue bags under his eyes. He didn’t need this. 

He played like a mess. Usually he was inhumanly focused, not one to be affected by his teammates heckling comments. But Aaron could see him frozen still, racquet hanging awkwardly in the wrong hand- vacant. He moved like he was on autopilot, still managing to play, but just barely. 

“Oh, Day! How the mighty fall!” yelled the other backliner when he missed a shot.

Knee-jerk reaction, Kevin threw his middle finger up at him. 

Aaron walked up behind him, “Wrong hand.” He muttered before walking backwards. Kevin turned around to him, before glancing down at himself. He cocked his head back in confusion followed by realization and switched hands.

The rest of the practise creaked by. Kevin got sent off 20 minutes before the end, endured a quick scolding from the coach, and didn’t look back as he stormed out of the building. But neither did Aaron, he ran off the court to catch up with him. 

“Kevin, slow down!” Aaron called for him, panting. 

“Fuck, it’s not the time!” Kevin screamed back, it echoed in the hallway.

“I’ll explain now,” he promised. 

Kevin came to a stop and inhaled sharply through his nose, eyes fixed on the ground. “You’ll tell the truth,” he looked at Aaron as he said.

“The whole truth, if you want it,” Aaron offered. 

They both changed out, wordlessly, then met each other outside the stadium. The moment Aaron stepped out into the cold air, Kevin spat out his first question. His eyes were narrowed like he was in pain. “Why that house?” he asked.

“It was-” _cheap._ No, Aaron wouldn’t use that excuse. He wanted the truth, and the truth involved getting into Andrew’s sick mind. “Since-” _since our mother died,_ no, he didn’t need _that_ truth. “Since we were 16, Andrew’s been able to see ghosts-”

“Fucking ghosts, you’re cra-”

“Just listen to me!” He said, voice harsh. “He never really contacted them, just saw them. But, recently, he’s- He’s been struggling to know what’s real and what isn’t. He’s bipolar, he gets fixated on pursuing bizarre things like this.”

Kevin ran his hands over his face, dragging his jaw and his eyes down in exhaustion. 

“So, when we saw the house, and he found out about what happened there. He wanted to try and communicate with any spirit that might be there. Because…”

“Enough people died in there,” Kevin said grimly.

“Exactly,” Aaron nodded, gulping. “I didn’t think he’d come and talk to you, that was out of order.”

“Was it Neil?”

“What?” Aaron furrowed his eyebrows. 

“The ghost, in the house. It was Neil.” Kevin said, firmly this time.

_Nathaniel,_ clicked Aaron. He didn’t know what to say, that he was now living with the ghost of his new friend’s old best friend? That his twin brother has been conversing with said ghost?

He nodded.

Kevin started to pace, his hands going from beside him to crossed to behind his neck. His breathing sped, before it very nearly stopped. “Will I be able to see him?”

“I- I, uh, I’m not sure… I don’t know.”

“Find out.” He ordered before walking off again. This time, into his car with a big slam of the door followed swiftly by the roar of an engine.

It would have been dramatic if he hadn’t stalled it.


	15. GIVE US A SIGN

Andrew was sat on the couch, head resting on the back, looking up at the ceiling. Sometimes he let his eyes flutter closed, but not enough to sleep. His ears were almost always ringing these days. He let the sound cloud over the empty sounds of the house, and let himself fall out of his head.

He lost a lot of time like this, just absent. He didn’t think or feel or do anything. It’s like he just stopped existing. It made him feel hollow. It made him want to crack himself open. Let something out. Let something in. Feel something. Anything.

But he wouldn’t do that.

He needed to distract himself, but his legs wouldn’t move. He felt like there was a weight on his chest, pinning him down. The need to push against it made his limbs ache. He didn’t realise he’d gotten this bad. 

And just like that, a distraction apparated. Well, actually, for once he just walked into the room like a normal person. That was, however, 100% more unsettling. He sat down on the couch next to Andrew, and didn’t say a word. Neither did Andrew.

So Andrew lit a cigarette because he felt like Neil needed one. He smoked it leisurely and blew the smoke upwards, head tilted up, because he knew Neil was watching him. He might have been letting Neil know he was ignoring him, but it seemed more like some showing off. 

Neil knew he was ignoring him, but kept watching. His eyes were fixed on the way Andrew’s chest rose and fell when he breathed, and the way he played with the smoke on his lips. It reminded him that he didn’t need to breathe anymore, but he still fell into the rhythm of Andrew’s breathing when he was around him.

His breath hitched when Andrew took the smoke in. He closed his eyes and let himself go through the motions, _inhale inhale hold exhale._ Smoking was one of the dumb things he missed from being alive.

He missed a lot of things. He missed running. He still could, but it never felt the same. He didn’t feel his feet hit the ground properly, wind hitting his skin felt warmer than he did, his chest didn’t ache when he stopped. Too much time he lost sprinting up and down the long hallway of the second floor, but it didn’t matter. He’d guessed that he’d be doing it forever.

He missed touching. He missed warmth and hands and hugs. Not that he got much when he was alive. He missed simple things like Kevin pulling his arm around Neil’s shoulders at the end of a game, in celebration. Or Kevin’s hand tight around his when he didn’t know how to handle Riko anymore. 

He missed Kevin. He wondered if he was okay, if Riko was still hurting him. Now he knew he had no way of protecting Kevin, he wished he had before. Guilt spread through him. It took him by shock, he’d felt things like his skin was numb. But now the stinging regret was all he could think about.

It was probably because he’d been spending more time around the living, but he wasn’t sure Andrew felt much of anything either.

Andrew finally turned to look at Neil, and it feels like he’s ran into a wall, his whole body cracking against it. “What do you want?” He asked dryly. 

Neil pulled his legs up onto the couch and tucked them against his chest. “Company?” He guessed. “You don’t have to talk.”

So Andrew didn’t talk. He sat and he almost existed until Neil wondered if Andrew was a ghost too. He seemed much less alive than Nicky and Aaron. But then again, Neil had never seen anyone as full of life as Nicky, who Neil had seen stumble into the house in the middle of the night countless times.

They sat in silence until the heard the door click open. Aaron trudged into the room, and flopped down into the seat in between Andrew and Neil. He didn’t know if Aaron could see him, he wasn’t trying to not be seen, and Andrew saw him earlier. But he wasn’t sure if it was just Andrew.

“Kevin knows now, you idiot,” Aaron sighed. 

Neil jumped out of his seat, and slung himself inhumanly across the room. This was something he hadn’t felt since he was alive. Anxiety. Why did the twins know Kevin? It could have been a different Kevin, his Kevin was still in West Virginia with Riko and Jean. 

_You mean you told him,_ Andrew stated bluntly. 

He was still but his eyes followed Neil around the room. Aaron definitely couldn’t see him. Neil only knew that he had responded to Aaron because Aaron replied. He guessed he’d done it in his head, and wondered why Aaron didn’t do the same.

“Only because you went and freaked him out. Why can’t you just stay away from my life? You did it for long enough? Why harass my friends now?” Aaron probably should have been screaming at Andrew, thought Neil, but he spoke in a tired, rhythmic tone. “The damage is done now, he wants to speak to Nathaniel.”

Neil froze. Andrew lost sight of him, and then every light in the house turned off. “For fucks sake,” muttered Andrew. The lights flickered back on and suddenly Neil was right in front of him, he pushed him back instinctively. 

And he fell back. Andrew’s hand didn’t go straight through him, he made contact with Neil’s scarred abdomen and he fell back. The contact came as a shock to both of them. Maybe it was his heightened emotional state, but Neil was a tangible thing. 

“What did you do?” He screamed, his voice boomed like it didn’t come out of him. Even Aaron noticed it, his face went pale with shock. 

“Neil,” Andrew said, composed and authoritative. 

Neil’s head was spinning, he couldn’t form a coherent thought. He felt overwhelmed. He hadn’t felt much of anything in years, now he felt like he was on fire. “Andrew,” he was almost pleading. Neil Wesninski did not plead. “Why did you talk to him?”

“Neil?” Aaron asked into the air where he guessed Neil was. “Uh, I can tell him we can’t contact you, if you don’t want to speak to him. It’s up to you.” 

Neil staggered back, lost and confused and close to breaking. Did he want to speak to Kevin? He’d never be able to live the life he lived with Kevin again, maybe it would just hurt him, to see him and everything he’d missed out on. It would hurt Kevin too, he’d probably grieved and healed and Neil couldn’t take him back. That was selfish. But perhaps, just for closure. Just to say goodbye.

The lights in the house still flickered and he was panting even though he didn’t need to breath, or was that him mimicking Andrew again? 

“Neil,” Andrew warned. “Calm down, before you take all the power out in the street.”

Neil tried to disappear, but it was like he’d forgotten how. It was almost like he was alive, but he hated it. It was just the pain, the rushing, buzzing flow through his veins of adrenaline was familiar and uncomfortable. He didn’t want this. He could go back to absent and lonely and hollow. Just not this.

Andrew took a few wary steps closer to Neil. “You do not need to decide, just to know.”

“How did you find him?” Neil narrowed his eyes. 

“No, no I didn’t do this deliberately. I didn’t look for him, I didn’t know.” Aaron stammered, he’d seemed to have pinpointed Neil’s location from his proximity to Andrew, still about two feet away but it looked like they were looking each other in the eyes. 

Then Andrew looked at Aaron, _don’t tell him about the transfer._

 _Why?_

Andrew bit his lip and looked back at Neil. He opened his mouth to explain, but Aaron spoke first. “I- I don’t think you can. I can’t see you, I can hear you but- it’s more like hearing Andrew…” His voice trailed off in thought.

His eyes flicked to Andrew warily. His eyes were shadowed over and so brown they were black, only reflecting brief flares from the trembling light. He wondered if his looked like that. It was unsettling in so many ways. He wished Katelyn could see the scene around him right now, if proof of the supernatural was what she wanted, this was it.

The air shifted, he saw Andrew falter back. And that made Neil all the more terrifying, a force that could move an immovable object. Yet, Andrew didn’t look as phased as he should have been getting hit by a ghost.

“Fuck you,” Neil said, pushing Andrew’s shoulder back. “I trusted you-”

“Don’t lie,” Andrew interrupted him, “that wasn’t trust.”

Neil pushed him again, but this time gripped his shirt afterwards like he didn’t want him to fall back. “Big mistake, Minyard. You know exactly what people like me did to people they didn’t trust,” Neil’s voice was hoarse and pained. 

“Keyword: _did,_ ” Andrew said through gritted teeth. Neil’s hand spread cold through his shirt and made him shiver, he was looking him dead in the eye. “What are you gonna do? Haunt my ankles?” 

He did not haunt Andrew’s ankles, but wrapped his hand around Andrew’s throat and dragged him down. Aaron winced, hands jerking to his own neck to pull off a hand that wasn’t there. Andrew struggled up, Neil kicked him down again the first time, he stood back and waited the second. There was a sick smile on Andrew’s lips, he threw a punch Neil’s way.

Neil flinched out of habit, but the pain was like an echo or a memory. Unreal. 

“Look, _Wesninski,_ ” Andrew breathed, “you are not invincible.” Andrew said this surely, but as far as he knew, Neil could be. Nonetheless, his fist made steady contact with Neil’s scar as a reminder. “And nor is Kevin, so calm the fuck down.”

Neil scoffed before disappearing. All the lights slowly glowed back to normal. Aaron let out a breath like he’d been holding it since he stepped through the door. Andrew looked at him blankly, just a small glint of what may have been disappointment, but other than that and the red marks on the side of his neck, he looked unphased.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey!! please comment and kudos i need validation ;-;


	16. UNDER YOUR SPELL

Now, Aaron really does know he shouldn’t be talking to Katelyn. He knows he was pushing it by talking to Kevin. Andrew seemed to let that slide when he saw Aaron acting like he didn’t care about Kevin, but about what Kevin had told him. He focused on that instead, and Andrew let himself get caught up in that mystery instead of the terms of their deal.

Not that that mattered, because Kevin almost definitely didn’t want to be his friend anymore- which was justified.  
He knows if Andrew knew he was developing feelings for someone, God only knows what he’d do to stop that. He knew that Andrew would never trust Katelyn, but he didn’t need to find out. He didn’t need to find out that Aaron was stepping through the door into Katelyn’s dorm room. 

She walked in ahead of him and immediately rushed to pick up a few t-shirts and books from the floor. “It’s a mess, oh God, I’m sorry,” she babbled as she abandoned the clutter in a pile on her bed. 

Aaron was a little distracted by the place. It was so very Katelyn. On the wall was a timetable marking her classes and practises, scattered over it were some warm fairy lights and a few stray photos of her and her friends. On her desk were yellow candles melted into the wood, next to amethysts and smokey quartz and a pile of textbooks. It was busy and contradictory, organised chaos.

“It’s all good, my place is definitely worse,” he assured her. Nicky was a mess, and Andrew didn’t care enough to clean up after himself, so the house was almost always... so much worse. 

They had went there to study, and if it had been any other girl than Katelyn, Aaron would’ve thought that was a euphemism. However Katelyn was as dedicated to her studies as Aaron, so they actually studied. Aaron sat at her desk running questions from a textbook and Katelyn lied on the floor answering them. She held her hands up to the ceiling as she answered, counting on her hands and gesturing when she couldn’t find the word for her answer. 

Aaron thought it was adorable, and he must have got distracted because Katelyn managed to correct his question before she gave an answer. 

She laughed at him and somehow it didn’t make him embarrassed or angry, it was a pure and sweet laugh. Then she groaned, “I’m so done with this.”

“Tell me about it,” he chuckled.

“Do you want a reading?” She asked abruptly.

“What?” 

“Tarot cards, everyone else thinks they’re weird so I have no one to practise on,” she explained. “And you’re in no position to think that fortune telling is weird.”

He sighed jokingly, “I guess you’re right. Go on then.”

She broke out into a shining wide grin and pulled herself off the ground to grab the cards. “Sit on the floor with me,” she ushered him over. She pulled the cards out of the worn down box and habitually shuffled them. Aaron sat himself cross-legged opposite her, only realising now he’d been avoiding eye contact with her all afternoon, and there was no getting out of it now.

She slid the cards Aaron’s way, and looked into his eyes as she spoke. “Okay so, I want you to shuffle the cards and think of a question, and nothing but the question.”

“A question?” 

She nodded.

“What if I don’t have a question?” 

He had a lot of questions, which was more the problem. _Why does my brother care more about the dead than the living? What is so wrong with having friends? How do I fix things for Kevin? Why am I still here, breaking my deal with Andrew? How do I let Nicky know he’s done everything he can? Tell me why this is my life now._

“Focus on an idea, a problem in your life or one of your goals. A specific time or place or person. Just focus,” She told him. Focusing was difficult when there were a pair of brown eyes glinting bronze and staring into your soul. 

He shuffled the cards and tried to fixate on his home life, disregarding the small haunting and more on his issues with Andrew. He didn’t need this to be about Kevin and Nathaniel, he didn’t need Katelyn to be involved- because he knew she’d want tobe.

He passed them back to Katelyn, “Now what?” He asked.

She didn’t respond but placed three cards in a row in front of Aaron. “These represent past, present and future,” she pointed at each with long pale fingers and a sharp pastel blue fingernail as she spoke.

She turned the first card over. It was a bright coloured picture with bold outlines, showing a man upside down, tied up by his feet. “The Hanged Man,” she read, “Which represents abandonment and readjustment, usually meaning the questioner is subject to changing times but usually in abeyance, or hesitant. They can’t progress due to their own hang ups.”

“Pun intended?” He asked her. She laughed and nodded, but kept her attention on the cards. 

“So that’s the past, want the present?” She offered, her hand hovering over the card. He nodded and she turned it carefully. “Four of cups. Which means you’re bored with the status quo, even disgusted maybe. It means the questioner is weary and dissatisfied with their current situation.”

It didn’t feel magical. It didn’t feel as powerful as the other night did, watching Andrew be attacked by Neil. But there was no denying how accurate the cards had been, but that magic all came from Katelyn. 

“Sounds about right,” he shrugged, a unfamiliar smile playing on his lips. 

“I’m always right,” she scowled at him theatrically as she said. She ran her hands over the cards again, lips pursed. “Now for the fun one.”

She flipped the card, “The Emperor, which signifies self-discipline and stability. The influence of The Emperor usually means you need to possess strong endurance and you can accomplish… Well, whatever you asked about.”

Aaron was nodding, looking at the spread of three cards. “That made you seem really mystical,” he teased. 

“I’m working on it!” She insisted, uncrossing her legs to pull her knees up in front of her. She wrapped her arms around her shins and rested her chin on her knees. 

“Sorry,” he smirked.

“As you should be,” she frowned, holding back a smile. She pushed her bottom lip out as she did and Aaron thought all kinds of troubling things. Scary, dangerous things like kissing and maybe running his hand through the strand of hair that fell from her ponytail.

Aaron picked up the Emperor card, looking at it. He was unsure all his hard work would get him anywhere, but he did like the idea. Things were anything but stable now, he liked to think one day he’d have control of his own life. 

He put it back down and inspected The Hanged Man, because there was no way he was denying the truth in the four of cups. He thought of how he felt when Tilda died, he felt like life was changing around him and he stayed just as scared, maybe more. He thought about how he tried to live the same as he did, it becoming harder and harder with Andrew’s new presence. 

“You okay?” She asked.

“Yeah,” he nodded passively, “Spooked.”

“Spooked?” She imitated his tone like an echo.

“Spooked.” He confirmed, only breaking into a laugh once Katelyn had. Everytime she looked back up at him, he repeated the word and she gave another giggle, and Aaron thought maybe if she was just a little closer he might have kissed her. But he wasn’t sure if she should get any closer. He pursed his lips to stop himself.

Katelyn did the same but that might have been to stop laughing at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's some witch-in-training katelyn and smitten aaron because im growing to love these two <3


	17. RELAPSE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey beautiful people! quick warning, theres a mention of self harm in this chapter. its not particularly graphic but i wanted to give warning. see the notes at the end of the chapter for details if you're worried <3

Lonely wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling to Andrew. He’d been lonely his whole life, surrounded by families he didn’t know. He knows lonely. But this was a new type of alone, an empty type of alone. The house was vast and vacant, and not in the way it had been before. There was no feeling of being watched, no chill across the floorboards, no ghost to come and sit with him to make him feel less alone. 

He didn’t miss it.

It was just strange. He’d grown accustomed to Neil’s presence, and now he was nowhere to be found. He was starting to believe that Neil existed less and less, Aaron had seen what Neil had caused, even almost heard him. It couldn’t have been a hallucination. Unless he was more delusional than he thought. 

He threw his fist into the wall with his entire weight. It split the plastering and the skin on his knuckles alike, but he _couldn’t fucking feel it._ He hurled punch after punch into the wall of his - Neil’s old bedroom. He pulled his hand back, uncurling his fingers to feel the ache and the crack of his knuckles. Sharply, he sucked a wincing breath through his teeth. It was a sigh of relief. 

He picked at the chapped skin on his fingers now, eyes transfixed on the reddened blots. Stumbling back, he sat on the side of the bed. He forced his hand down, trying not to look at it. He wouldn’t fall down that rabbit hole. But in the end, what snapped him out of it was a crash from behind him. 

Mirroring the holes Andrew left in the wall was a singular crack in the wall. It was more a of a dent, from supernatural force applied to the brick wall. “Mature,” he scoffed. Neil didn’t appear. He didn’t throw back a snarky comment or call him out on his hypocrisy, because he just wasn’t there. But he was. 

When Andrew saw a body turn the corner into his room, he got stupidly expectant that Neil would walk in and ask him why he was attacking the wall. _After all, the wall had done nothing wrong._ He could almost hear the dragging sarcasm in Neil’s voice. But it wasn’t Neil.

It was Nicky. He had this nervous smile on his lips, teetering from foot to foot as he walked into the room. He didn’t walk more than two steps in, for fear of invading Andrew’s personal space, so he just loitered. “You all right?” He asked. He didn’t say this like ‘you alright?’ to ask if he was content, to ask how he was feeling. He knew better. He just simply asked if everything was right, not good just the way it was. 

It wasn’t- so Andrew didn’t give him answer.

He gave him a nod of acknowledgement. Nothing more. Nicky frowned, it was theatric because Andrew wasn’t sure if Nicky had a frown. Not that he hadn’t seen Nicky sad, but when he was sad he smiled more. It was an unsure thing, an attempt to encourage everyone else to smile. Actually, not dissimilar to the smile he was wearing earlier - just a little less hopeful.

He looked around the room, but payed hardly any mind to the punch marks in the baby blue walls. He just looked around as if he saw in every way that more than one soul lived in that room. It was like it was split between past and present, preserved history. “How’s the job?” Nicky asked mindlessly, as if he couldn’t just as easily ask any of the co-workers how Andrew was doing. He probably had checked on him. 

“It’s a job,” he shrugged.

Nicky rolled his eyes at him, leaning his back against the doorframe. He didn’t meet Andrew’s eyes, but looked at the crack in the wall behind him. “You and Aaron talking again?” Nicky asked. 

“More or less.”

“Good good,” he nodded uncomfortably. Then said what he meant to say the moment he stepped into the room, “I’m going out with some friends. Do you wanna come with? Just you really need to get out of the house.”

Andrew exhaled through his nose, “I’ve got work.”

“Oh, alright. Cool. Just let me know,” Nicky said, putting his hands into his pockets and turning around the door.

“Nicky?” He called, the word came out before he thought but now he had Nicky’s undivided attentions. So he asked: “Do you believe me?”

“That you’ve got work? No, I think you’re just trying to get out of socialising.” Nicky joked easily. Andrew didn’t laugh. He pursed his lips, “You mean about the ghosts?”

“Yes,” Andrew said.

Nicky inhaled a sharp breath through his teeth, “Yes. I believe that you and Aaron can talk in your heads, ghosts is only a step up… It’s real. I’m sure of it.” He looked Andrew in the eye as he said those words, which was unusual as he tended to avoid eye-contact with Andrew. He wasn’t scared of him anymore, Andrew guessed. It was good, he had no reason to be. Andrew trusted Nicky to never deliberately do anything stupid.

Andrew nodded in thanks and Nicky left again.

Andrew stretched across the bed to grab a cigarette and smoke it as quick as he could. He needed to calm down, he felt jittery and restless. Really, he felt nothing. But his whole body protested against that fact, quite mania clawing at his skin from the inside. Talking to Nicky had helped, for once. It was nice to know he wasn’t going insane. But it wasn’t enough. He sat and he tried not to pick at his bleeding knuckles, he smokes 4 more cigarettes until he was dizzy enough to fall asleep, and he woke up late for work. 

Really, he wanted to call in sick. He was hitting a low and didn’t need to show it, which is what made him go in. He didn’t need Nicky worrying about him. After a few deep breaths, he dragged himself up to splash his face with cold water. Seeing his sorry state in the mirror only made it worse. 

He’d also really like to blame it on the energy. But with Neil almost completely absent, the house was a blank canvas for emotion. He couldn’t blame any outside influence other than the stupid chemicals in his brain. Fuck, everything was blank. His brain had been replaced by a sharp ringing sound and his spine was now the serrated edge of a knife.

Shut down, he got himself to work and let the music fill the space. He didn’t like it, but it was better than silence. He didn’t really talk to customers, as much as Matt encouraged him too. A few of them liked the way he ignored them, and let their drunken rambles spill out onto deaf ears. 

“Andrew,” a solemn tone cut through the giddy cheers. Andrew turned begrudgingly to see Kevin Day. He would have been shocked if he thought it was actually happening. He knew it was, he was as lucid and reasonable as he got. Nonetheless, he took a double-take on that tattooed face.

“Kevin Day,” he regarded him.

“Aaron isn’t talking to me, I want answers.” He said monotonously. Everything had seemed monotonous today, but Andrew was sure of this switch in Kevin’s tone. It was like he’d ran out of tears. Andrew kind of liked this steel-exterior Kevin was wearing, even if he saw right through it. Cold. Cold he could work with. 

Andrew hummed, “Answers?”

“Neil.”

He didn’t need to say anything else, he didn’t even need to say that. Nonetheless, Andrew kept his face blank to wait for Kevin to continue.

“...Can I- Can I-” 

Kevin realised this was not the conversation to have in a cold mindset, too many emotions clouded things usually. But now, stable and cut-off, the right answer was clear- But it wasn’t the answer he wanted. Move on.

“Can I talk to him?” Kevin eventually spoke.

“Do you want to?” Andrew asked, fixing him a drink upon no request.

“For fuck’s sake, do you answer questions ever?” Kevin groaned. 

“You can not talk to him, unless you have some spiritual affinity that you haven’t told me about.” Andrew replied. It was a dry, sarcastic reply that didn’t come from a place of humour but ridicule.

Kevin shot him a black look, sharp and warning. “Do you?”

Andrew inhaled through his nose, telling him would be trouble. He looked at Kevin’s dark glare, maybe he wanted trouble. He silently scolded himself for the thought, and said, “I do not deliver whimsical medium readings for free, if that is what you think.”

Kevin rolled his eyes, “You are impossible.”

“And you are desperate for answers. What is it you want?” 

“To talk to him- what?”

“Tell me what you want to know, or to tell him. Maybe I will see what I can do. It’s not as easy as just _asking._ ” Andrew told him, but it kind of was. Or used to be. There was no candles, or pentagrams, no ouija boards and no ceremony. But, he let Kevin think that if it meant he kept his distance.

Kevin considered this for a while. What would he tell Neil? He’d tell him that everyday without him Riko became more unbearable. He’d apologise for thinking that Neil could disobey his father. He wouldn’t tell him about his hand, about his transfer to Baltimore. And he _still_ wouldn’t tell him what he really meant to him.

“It’s not that… I just, I miss him,” Kevin admitted, not processing the words until he spoke them.

“Seeing him will not make matters better, it will be a relapse.” 

Kevin felt uncomfortably _read._ Andrew saw right through him. The knowing that Neil was still… Here. Not here, somewhere. That Andrew could talk to him and he couldn’t, his heart panged with jealousy. He picked up the drink and swallowed half of it down. 

It was a vodka and coke, which may have been a coincidence, or Andrew remembered it from their first meeting. It was unsettling to Kevin, how much Andrew seemed to know about him. No, _how well he knew him. _Some part of him hoped it was because Neil had told Andrew something, anything, about him.__

__He realised he sounded pathetic and downed the rest of the drink. “Thanks for the drink,” he said bitterly before disappearing into the crowd. And probably straight out of the building, he was almost definitely not in the mood to dance._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the self harm mention was andrew punching a wall multiple times to feel something, also mentions picking at the scabs. as i said, its quite brief, but im sorry if it affected you at all <3 thank you all for reading!


	18. HYPOTHESIS

Aaron let class drone on around him, mind too hazy from sleep deprivation to concentrate. Maybe if he dozed off in this lecture, he’d have an excuse to talk to Katelyn and get the notes from her. He couldn’t concentrate even if he wanted to. His mind spun with images of light bulbs blowing and his brother getting attacked. He remembered the feeling on Neil’s fists even now, his throat felt like it was closing up. And Andrew didn’t even seem bothered.

Maybe it was less scary when you could see them- why couldn’t he see them? He could hear the echoes of Neil’s words from Andrew’s mind but it wasn’t a different voice. It was more like something cold dripping down his neck, communicating the idea palpably. It made him shiver. 

He wanted to tell Katelyn, so bad. He wanted to see her eyes light up at the possibility, the problem to solve. How would Aaron communicate with Neil? He wanted to find a way, to fix things with Kevin. He was Aaron’s closest friend, which was sad, he knew. But Katelyn must know how to do it, how to speak to the dead. She seemed to know everything else, to tell the future, read palms, cure insomnia. Earlier in the week she had given him some valerian root to help him sleep. When he insisted he didn’t think herbal remedies worked, she shut him down by explaining the reasoning for its sedative properties. Aaron was so enchanted by her; impossibility and actuality, science and witchcraft.

However, no matter how much neurotransmitter the remedy threw at his brain, it would not send him to sleep that night. He felt so watched, like he hadn’t before. Before the house had made him a little uncomfortable, there was an unshiftable chill and the feeling like he was walking on glass- but he had put that down to his supernatural intuition. Not actual ghosts. Ghost, singular. A ghost of a boy that Kevin once knew, to make it even more uncanny. 

He doodled mindlessly as he thought. He was not an artist, he drew repetitive lines and squares that overlapped into piles of paper. He ground the pen so hard into the paper that the notebook became almost redundant. Experimentally, he wrote down Katelyn’s name, just wondering what it looked like in his handwriting. Becoming embarrassed with himself, he turned the page and started a fresh set of scribbles. 

Katelyn caught him after class, greeting him a with a wide grin. He hoped her sunny disposition would rub off on him. They walked across campus together, talking casually about classes. 

“-that valerian any help?” She cut Aaron off when he was talking about how tired he was. 

He shrugged, “Made me more tired, for sure.”

“But you didn’t sleep?” She almost winced when she said the words.

“Nope,” he replied. 

She slumped in defeat. And it might have been the way the low hanging sun shone straight onto them, or how vacant the field in between buildings was, how alone he felt with her. The sunshine was like walls around them, every sound so distant. But Aaron took a chance, he grazed his hand against hers. She turned her palm so he could lace his fingers with hers.

Aaron was very obviously not looking at Katelyn as he did this, deliberately not taking his eyes off the horizon. Something this simple made Aaron feel like he was on fire. Andrew couldn’t see him here, but he still couldn’t shake the idea of Andrew finding out. Katelyn let her shoulder push close against his as they walked, and Aaron let himself smile. 

“Katelyn,” Aaron said. He decided he prefered saying her name out loud to writing it. She turned to him with a short questioning hum. It was comfortable and casual and was not the right reaction for the question he was about to ask. “How did you see your grandpa’s ghost?” 

Katelyn furrowed her eyebrows, “How do you mean?”

“Like, what did you do?” 

“Nothing. As I said, I was very young. He was just there,” Katelyn explained, her face was contorted like she was thinking or the sun was in her eyes.

“Sorry to bring it up,” Aaron said quietly, his voice a nervous diminuendo. “I just,” he paused, his grip on Katelyn’s hand tightening. “Are you okay?”

Katelyn didn’t look sad, just distant. It was an alien look on a girl who lived in the future rather than the past. “Yeah, yeah. I’m fine, it’s just… Weird to think about.” 

Aaron nodded. They had both stopped now, Aaron turned slightly towards her. She turned towards him now, like she’d snapped herself out of it. “I didn’t do anything, I just saw him. I’ve been trying to understand why ever since…” She trailed off as if she had finished the sentence in her head, and Aaron wished he could hear her thoughts too.

“It’s just, Andrew can see ghosts. And I can’t.”

“He can see ghosts?!” She said abruptly. Usually, Aaron would resent someone’s fascination with Andrew. But the way she said it was gleeful. She’d just been told that she wasn’t alone, she wasn’t the only one. Aaron could sympathise. 

He nodded, “I just don’t get _why?_ ”

She pursed her lips and started walking again. Aaron noted that she moved when she thought, just like when she spoke with her hands. “I have one theory,” she said cautiously, like she was afraid she’d be proved wrong. 

“Go on,” Aaron said. 

She stopped again. “We’re going to be late for class, and this is… a long story. Are you busy after chemistry?” 

This made Aaron quite anxious, she could probably feel his clammy hand in hers. “Uh, no. Havana Java after class?” Katelyn agreed, less sunny than Aaron would have liked. “Should I be worried?” He asked. She nodded, more sunny than Aaron would have liked. 

Then she reached her free hand out to push a strand of Aaron’s hair that had blown in the wind, which was making his fringe point the wrong way and clearly was bothering Katelyn more than him. It felt quite fussy and strange, and made Aaron feel ridiculous. Satisfied by fixing it, she smiled thinly and dragged him up the stone steps into the building.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ill explain this soon i promise
> 
> love you all <3 thank for for reading, pls comment n kudos


	19. CALL ME COLD

To even begin his internal debate of whether to let Kevin speak to Neil, he needed to find him first. 

“Neil,” He called when he walked down into the basement. He was alone in the house again and free to talk to the vacant air all he liked. Not that Nicky would even be surprised at this point, and not that Aaron doesn’t already know what he’s doing. “Neil?” 

For all he knew, Neil could be standing in front of him and just choosing not to be seen. He could be ridiculing him. Standing in that basement made him want to vomit. Bad energy swirled around him in dark, wispy circles. There was so much past noise that it all came to was deafening static. He wondered why he hadn’t noticed this before. Perhaps Neil provided some sort of barrier, like all he could feel was Neil’s energy. He didn’t like needing Neil there.

He walked each room of the house- even Nicky’s and Aaron’s. Before he circled back to his room. The matching holes were still there, he wandered over to the damage Neil caused. He ran his fingertip over the crack in the solid wall slowly, placing his own fist into it. He took a deep breath. “You know, this house price was decreased enough without you throwing holes into the walls. I might just have to plaster that.” He said, dry and sarcastic. 

Neil didn’t reply, maybe didn’t even hear it. 

He didn’t want to say it. Saying it would just make Neil angrier, and would it really benefit Andrew? He could just stay out of it, and never talk to Neil again. He should just. But-

“Neil Wesninski,” he tried. Last time he had used Neil’s full name, it had almost… summoned him. “ _Nathaniel Wesninski._ ”

It worked. Neil appeared standing against the wall, a clear scowl on his pale face. It wasn’t really much of anything magical; he wasn’t there, and then he was. “No.”

He disappeared again, just as unremarkably as he had appeared. 

“Nathaniel Wesninski,” he said again.

“No.”

“Nathaniel Wesninski.”

“Stop.”

“Nathaniel Wesnin-”

“What do you want?!” He shouted, the sound amplified in Andrew’s ears. He’d heard it in both ways, the way he heard sound and the way he heard Aaron. He wondered if that meant that Aaron heard it too. 

Andrew tried to remain unphased, “I wanted to know if you have made a decision yet.”

This was true, but it wasn’t really why he’d called for him. Not that he’d admit that to any living soul, or any dead soul for that matter. Not even himself, thought he was becoming unsure about which category he fell into.

“Neil,” he said, but it really meant _sorry._

“You know, it gets really lonely. Being dead.” He started, his whole body tense. “All this time, just fucking stuck in this house I didn’t even want to be in when I was alive. Stuck with a wound that will never heal, and you know what? I don’t _want_ to extend my pain to him. I don’t- It’s selfish to cut him back on his grieving, take him back to square one. But I miss him.”

Andrew pursed his lips and nodded.

“How,” he stuttered, “How long has it been again?” 

“You have been dead for 2 years,” Andrew informed him. He shouldn’t be so blunt, this was what he wanted, to speak to Neil. That’s what Kevin wanted and that’s what Andrew had taken for granted. Maybe he understood why Kevin had become so addicted to this brash broken boy. But Andrew didn’t _need_ to have an addiction like Kevin did.

Neil made this horrible choking sound. He had no idea how long it had been, as days blurred when all you did was run up and down hallways with breath that would never run out. In an empty house until recently, he had no way of telling what the date was. Him and Kevin would have been twenty now; still in college, playing for the Ravens… Maybe. If things had gone that way, but they hadn’t. Knowing how long just made Neil’s heart ache more, all that time they could have spent together… Not together. As much as he wished, he’d never be able to really _be with Kevin._ Too many complications, most of them under the name Riko.

“If I do talk to Kevin,” the words felt robotic coming out of his mouth, so impossible. “It will have to be at the end of the semester, so he can get here.” Too impossible, how would he get away from Riko? From holiday practises? 

Andrew realised he’d been holding his breath, “That won’t be a problem.” He said before exhaling. 

“Oh, it will,” Neil chuckled humorlessly. In any other situation, Neil knows Andrew would have to drag Kevin off the court kicking and screaming.

He remembered he wasn’t supposed to tell Neil that Kevin now went to UMB, which he was yet to understand why. He added that to the list of things to figure out, just under the meaning of life. He avoided the topic, but what he said was no less heart-wrenching. “He already comes to Baltimore ev-” Andrew said, Andrew witheld the truth. He was sure Neil would see through it, but he was too foggy eyed. “To visit your grave.”

Neil’s mouth gaped open, and his eyes went distant. It all became too real, just how dead he really was. He thought about the headstone, with his godforsaken name on it. He thought about his corpse, rotting under the soil. He thought about his body’s proximity to those of his parents, assuming they were all buried in the same place. The thought of his father rotting was far from comforting. His mother, well, he did not let himself go there.

But _Kevin_ had visited his grave. Did he speak to him? Did he leave flowers? Neil would make fun of him if he found out that he had left flowers, as grossly inappropriate as that felt. 

“The only thing is, he won’t be able to see you.”

“Aaron can’t see me either, why you?” 

_Why me?_ Andrew thought. Perhaps because he was the most experienced with death out of all of them, maybe because he had been the one to look for Neil. He didn’t know. 

“I did what you did.” Andrew said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey thank u for reading!! comment, kudos, message me on tumblr ( http://kevinyard.tumblr.com/ )


	20. REMEMBER

Aaron remembers being hunched over in a plastic chair, knees to his chest, while death busied itself around him. Sharp beeps and worried voices and rushed footsteps echoed down the hallway. There were only two other people in the waiting room, one was sobbing into his sleeve, the other was just bored. Aaron didn’t think that this was where his life needed to shatter. It was too late, or too soon. Something like this had been a long time coming, had he wanted it?

Aaron remembers the feeling of his heart stopping when it happened. Not when he found out, when it _happened._ He felt paralysed, with no idea why. He felt the cold asphalt against his back and the rhythmic pressure on his chest. He gasped a breath that wasn’t his own minutes later, and that’s when he realised what was missing. His body had taken him to the hospital, but he wasn’t sure how. He’d sat down to wait, but he didn’t know what for. Andrew was hurt- that was all he knew.

He hardly knew this boy, they’d only met a few months ago. Still, he had promised to protect Aaron, and maybe that should have been enough. It was his twin. It was that nagging insistence of Aaron being something more than himself. It was the ghosts of pain in his stomach every night for years. It was a feeling he had always had, good or bad, and he didn’t think he’d ever lose it. 

But it was gone. For a grand total of 4 minutes, Aaron was alone. For the first time in his life, he felt empty. Completely and utterly lonesome. He thought about how this was only the second time that he and this stranger had existed without each other in all of their 16 years. And he couldn’t stop thinking about it, what he was supposed to mean to Aaron and what he was. 

Why couldn’t he stop thinking about it? His mother was _dead._ And Andrew had killed her. He had no doubt in his mind about it. She had done horrible, horrible things to him. She had treated him like shit, but she was his mother, he should feel…Angry? Hurt? Upset? He didn’t know what he was supposed to feel, because couldn’t think of any other feeling than his empty head and his shallow breaths. He couldn’t stop thinking about how (albeit, secondhand) death felt. 

And then he was let into the room. 

It felt like trespassing, was this boy really his family? The doctors had let him in- of course they had, the boy wore his face. He treaded carefully across the floor to where Andrew was. Barely conscious, he tried to keep his eyes open to follow Aaron across the room. He saw Andrew’s fresher wounds: the bloody graze over his left eyebrow, the bruise that followed it down his cheek bone. Aaron had a matching one on his right side, from his mom. He also felt the pain in his ribs that must have come from CPR. 

He _died._

Yet Aaron still couldn’t help but see his older scars. This was the first time he had seen Andrew not wearing those armbands. He had felt those pains before, almost every day. Faint and itching, but always accompanied by sick panic. But the scars never appeared on his arms, there they were.

He looked at Andrew and he tried to understand. Andrew had killed his mother, because he was protecting Aaron? Or because he was protecting himself? They both felt each of those punches, Aaron more than Andrew. Had he just killed her because _he_ couldn’t take it? Aaron had endured that abuse for years, and now, he was angry.

The feeling rose up in his chest like running water. It had been dripping for days, slowly, when Tilda had beaten him. Even with Andrew there, he wasn’t protected. Now the water rushed and sloshed in his ribcage, it started to boil. That wasn’t protection; it was just murder, it was just cowardice. Aaron could have just gotten out, less than 2 years and he could have been off to college. Now he had to face life without a mother, not that she had been much of one before. He was officially orphaned. And all because of a boy who knew nothing about his life. 

He felt rage racing through his body, but what was he supposed to do with it? Tilda would have thrown a punch by now, but Aaron couldn’t. “You coward,” he spat. He surged forward a few steps, let his grip wrap around the plastic side of the hospital bed. 

_I am not a coward, you are the one who couldn’t defend yourself,_ He said, as clear as day in Aaron’s mind. The intrusive feeling of Andrew’s thoughts in Aaron’s head just made him angrier. 

He hunched over Andrew, pressing his fingers hard to his broken ribs. He could feel it in his own, even worse because of how close they were. “You-” he breathed, “-are the one who couldn’t take it.”

Andrew choked at the pressure on his bruised chest, but for just a moment. Aaron looked him in the eyes, seeing his own pain reflected back in them-- Fading. He then looked at his hand, and Aaron could almost hear the cogs turning in his brain. But that was just because of how deadly silent the room had become, nothing but the distant hustle outside the door. Aaron had tried to hurt him, and had healed him. Then he saw skin repair over Andrew’s eye; red and purple and green fading back to pink. He stumbled back in disbelief. His eyes flickered from Andrew’s absent wounds to the door to Andrew again. 

He was looking at him, blank as ever, maybe just a slight twinge of interest. A slight twitch of his eyes to look at Aaron like he wasn’t just looking through him. Aaron reached his hand up to touch his still bruised temple, running his hands lightly over the swelling. Andrew mirrored his action, touching his own untarnished skin. 

Then he scoffed, “You couldn’t hurt me if you tried.”

And Aaron actually lost it this time. He propelled himself towards Andrew, “You wanna bet on that?” 

Andrew smiled at him, faint but obnoxious. But Aaron only caught a glimpse of his before his fist obstructed his view of Andrew’s face, colliding straight with his nose. He could feel it in his own, the all too familiar ache of a broken nose. He hardly registered it because of the adrenaline running through him. He hit him again, this time to his jaw so his head threw to the side. 

“Fuck you! You think you fucking know! You don’t!” Aaron said through gritted teeth. He was panting, feeling distant shooting pains in his chest as he did. He ached with exhaustion, his voice cracked as he said, “She was my mother.”

“She abused you,” Andrew stated. 

“I had it handled,” Aaron bit back weakly, retreating.

“You did not,” he said, “You wouldn’t have survived another year with her.”

“Then you clearly know nothing about survival,” said Aaron. 

Andrew’s mouth curved into a sharp smile, “I’m still here, aren’t I?” 

Survival happened to be one of Andrew’s strongest competencies. And what happened that day was just another example of that, but that’s not what Aaron had meant. Aaron meant resilience, facing facts and enduring struggle. Andrew meant retaliation, fighting back and making it out alive by the skin of his teeth. 

Aaron remembers coming closer than he’d ever been to understanding Andrew that day, and remembers this all sat in a booth with Katelyn. She spoke her own story solemnly, no sporadic hand gestures, just tapping her coffee cup with her nails as she spoke into it. Aaron was struggling to get out of his head, and he thought Katelyn must be feeling the same. He didn’t like seeing her so down. 

“-and yeah...It was just a allergic reaction. My mom rushed me to hospital, I don’t remember much. All I really know is I should have died. My heart stopped for no longer than a minute. And after that, I saw him.”

“I’m so sorry,” Aaron murmured, wishing he could put his hand out to hers like last time. 

“It’s okay, I was like 5,” she shrugged, “He must have passed on, because I only saw him once. Maybe, he just wanted to see me one last time…”

Aaron pursed his lips, he supposed it all made sense now. Actually, he felt kind of dumb for not realising. Truth was, he was trying to forget that day, and the weeks that followed. But that was besides the point, maybe Neil just needed to see Kevin one last time? And then he’d be gone? And, just maybe, it’d give Kevin the same closure too? 

He knew the right answer now.

He reached his hand across the table to pry Katelyn’s fingers from her mug and wrap his own around them. She looked at her hand, then Aaron’s face. She had she watery smile as she started to feel more at ease. 

“God, I must sound so fucking ridiculous! I always scare people off like this,” she said with a hoarse voice. “Shit, fuck,” she muttered as she pulled her hand, still in Aaron’s to her forehead. She was hiding her face to not look Aaron in the eye. 

Aaron spoke to the top of her head instead, “That’s not going to scare me off,” he pursed his lips, biting the chapped skin as he thought. His voice was so soft he hardly recognised it. “It’s quite hard to scare me, you’re going to have to try harder if you want me gone.”

She sighed a laugh, and Aaron pressed a tiny kiss to her knuckle before she released his hand. “Thank you,” Katelyn said.

Aaron shook his head, “no, thank you. I think I understand now.”

Katelyn raised an eyebrow. 

Aaron shrugged as if what he was saying wasn’t supposed to be tragic, “Andrew was in a car crash... two years ago? His heart stopped… I felt it. It makes sense now.”

Katelyn chuckled in relief, “It’s not just me.”

“It’s real,” Aaron reassured her, spurring her back into her gleeful mood. Aaron was happy to see it, so he shook off the memories of that hospital room and joined her in her joy. Being with Katelyn made Aaron feel like everything else in his life was a nightmare, and with her he was just awake.


	21. NOT YOUR ANSWER

“What?”

“I did what you did.”

“You said already, you killed your mother,” Neil said, head turned to the side in confusion. Andrew kept his eyes locked on the pale stretch of neck the movement showed, wanting to reach out and touch the pulseless memory of skin. He wanted to know how real he really was.

“No, I did what you did. I died,” he explained. 

“I’m something of an expert on being dead, and I would say that you are very much alive.” Neil said, grating sarcasm as unwelcoming as ever- it made Andrew want to bare his teeth if it would not be mistaken for a smile. 

“I was dead for 4 minutes. I was resuscitated right next to the car wreck, I’ve got the broken rib to prove it.” Andrew told him, quite casually. 

“That’s why you can see me,” Neil said quietly. Andrew nodded. He seemed to go blank for a moment, and unnaturally still, before saying, “You hit me.” He said this factually, not like he was hurt or offended. 

Andrew raised an eyebrow, “Do you want an apology?”

“No,” he slouched a little when he said this. 

“What do you want?” Andrew inquired. 

Neil shuffled a bit, like he was ready to bolt again. Andrew wondered whether he’d be able to grab him to get him to stay, or if his hand would fall straight through. Although, he couldn’t say that he wanted to. “I just- It was like I was real,” Neil said quietly.

Andrew’s face tightened into a thoughtful look. He didn’t know much about ghosts, of course he’d looked into it, but the internet held so many conflicting accounts that it was impossible to know what was myth and what was fact. Then again, it was impossibly to know what of Neil was myth and what was fact. 

“I’m not going to hit you again,” Andrew said.

Neil scoffed, “That’s not what I meant.”

Getting full answers out of Neil was like pulling teeth. Slowly but surely, Andrew spelled out his question for Neil, “What did you mean?”

With a shrug, Neil mumbled, “Didn’t mean anything by it. It was just strange.”

“Well, don’t worry your pretty hollow head about it; I am not going to do it again.” 

“My head is not hollow,” Neil insisted, mostly for his pride because maybe his head was hollow. He thought a lot more when he was alive, but with all the time he had to think, it was probably for the best that he didn’t dwell.

Andrew just smirked. It was obnoxious and slight, but Neil was sort of pleased with himself that Andrew was smiling. It wasn’t something Andrew did around his brother or his cousin. So maybe not a smile, but a smirk would do. Something had cracked his mask, and Neil would take the insult if it meant he could chip away at the walls Andrew had built around himself.

“Is Kevin the only reason you have spoken to me?” Neil asked abruptly, even surprising himself with the question. 

Andrew inhaled slowly through his nose. “I didn’t know Kevin when I met you. I didn’t know you knew each other, because you hide that tattoo.”

Neil instinctively pulled his hair forward on his face. “My father didn’t like it. It was proof the Moriyama’s owned me, because they owned him, really. They’d made their payment, but it wasn’t like he had much of a choice anyway- it was a matter of civility.” 

Stupidly, Andrew stepped forward to push the mess of auburn from Neil’s cheek and show the tattoo. Unbelievably, the hair moved. Andrew could feel the frayed ends of it on his finger, and the soft skin over Neil’s temple. He kept his hand there only briefly before saying, “Your father is not here.”

“I’m not the biggest fan of it either,” said Neil.

“You’re not the one who has to look at it,” Andrew countered, “You don’t even have a reflection.”

Neil rolled his eyes, and in the moment where none of the blue of his iris was visible, he looked somehow less fearsome. There was something unreal and unsettling about his eyes. Though Andrew had been told the same about his own, that when no light caught them, they looked pitch black and unforgiving. He hadn’t really noticed it in himself, but Aaron’s eyes had been that dark shade before, when he was afraid. 

“I suppose you’re right, you _are_ the only one who has to look at me,” Neil said. The idea was uncomfortable, that only that pair of piercing eyes would really see him. Still, he did not look away from him. Their eyes stayed locked like there was nothing else worth looking at, everything about it felt quite occult.

“And how lucky I am.” Andrew said dryly.

Neil forced out a laugh, “Oh! I see, you’re funny now?”

“I have been hysterical this whole time, did you not notice?” 

“Mh, I think it’s an acquired taste,” Neil smirked. 

Andrew realised how close they were now. Neil was backed against the wall, leaning back just enough to be at Andrew’s height. Andrew was no more than two feet away, so he had nowhere else to look other than Neil. He started to notice the less stark features of his face; his pale eyebrows, delicate and high cheekbones, a nose a little too large and a little too crooked for his age, the way his lips seemed to naturally form a sulky pout. 

He only got a grip when he realised how cold Neil was making the air around him. He shivered slightly, not wanting to be the one to step back first. He wasn’t sure if it was a game, but the daring look in Neil’s eyes was a sign that pointed to yes. 

“You avoided my question,” Neil said, letting his back fall against the wall without falling through it. Something about Andrew was making him substantial. 

“You have been avoiding my questions for months,” Andrew quickly retorted. 

“I’ve stopped now, I told you about my father _willingly,_ ” Neil insisted.

“So tragedy has become currency now, I see.” His reply was needlessly esoteric, hopelessly vague, and saturated with sarcasm; Neil was overcome with fondness. He’d wished Andrew had been a friend in his life before, thinking that he would have gotten on with Jean and Kevin. Most importantly, he would have irritated Riko to the ends of the Earth. Neil smiled.

Andrew seemed to take that smile as reasoning and said, “If you haven’t noticed, I don’t have any friends.”

“You don’t seem to want them,” Neil shrugged. Anyone could see how introverted Andrew was, and how he shielded this part of himself carefully with his intimidatingly quiet exterior.

“Not really, no.”

“But you’re stuck with me?”

“Unless you plan on going anywhere,” Andrew replied.

Neil hummed with a slight frown, “I don’t think I can.”

“You cannot leave?” Andrew checked. 

“No. I’ve tried, but I just can’t make it to the door.”

Andrew gave a quick frown before pulling a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. He lit two and passed one to Neil, stepping back once Neil had taken it. He looked happy with the fact that he could hold it still, and nodded thanks at Andrew. He put it in his mouth, unable to inhale any smoke. Of course he couldn’t- he didn’t have lungs, he didn’t breathe. 

He thought about his mother, as he often did when he caught a whiff of cigarette smoke. The smell used to follow her around the house as she smoked 20 a day. It was strange to be dead and to grieve a loved one simultaneously. Her death was less justified than his, she was a bystander. Killed by his father’s rage, she died slowly and painfully. Andrew had killed his own mother, but Neil would kill to have his back. 

Neil decided his thoughts worked quicker around Andrew, that he was brought up to the pace of the living around him. He quite liked it, feeling real. So he sat and he watched Andrew smoke. He pretended he was alive, that they were just two boys who had never been dead hanging out like normal. Neil couldn’t fool himself, ever the realist, but he could try.

If he managed to find a way to communicate with Kevin, he could sit like this with him, he could exist with him. Even if he couldn’t, he could just listen to Kevin talk. He missed that voice, the low and comically exhausted muttering in French that only Neil would hear, the hoarse yelling across the court, the unsteady whispers in Neil’s ear when they we’re too afraid to touch. It was hell, but it was home. 

That couldn’t be the answer though. It could never work now. It was too late, Neil was dead. Was there even a right answer? Surely it was already the end for Neil, then why was he still here, his suffering prolonged? There must be something else, thought Neil. There must be a way to take him out of this loop, to give him reason.


	22. THUNDER

Andrew felt like he was floating through his days now, his stupidly stable life seemed like nothing now. He floated to work, he floated around the club, drifting from meaningless conversation to meaningless conversation. He was even more unresponsive than usual, and the punters found it even more endearing. He floated away from them easily, and he floated home. 

The only action he’d put thought into was driving to the graveyard, not even thinking over the decision to take Aaron with him. He stepped into the car and closed the door with a slam, but didn’t say anything. Andrew and Aaron didn’t talk much, but Andrew was sure something was bothering his twin. His eyes flickered from the road ahead to Aaron until he said, “What’s up with you?”

Aaron visibly flinched. 

“Nothing, I- I’ve been thinking a lot about that night,” Aaron said. He didn’t really need to specify, only something to do with Tilda could make him this jittery. _I know you’re not sorry. I’m not dumb enough to expect that from you._ He finished in Andrew’s head before speaking aloud again, “But it’s why you can see Nathaniel, isn’t it?”

Andrew nodded, turning into the quietest bit of town he’d seen. His eyes travelled up the church spire to avoid Aaron’s gaze. It was an eerie place, and late winter fog rolled through to amplify the feeling, or maybe that was the horror movie twins sat in the car out front. Andrew didn’t like this knowing feeling he got in graveyards, but he was glad for it, being the same sense that allowed him to see and hear Neil.

“But that means Kevin can’t see him, so why are we doing this?” Aaron asked. 

_Neil can manipulative inanimate objects, he could write something. He better be able to, I do not want to mediate._

It occurred to Andrew how stupid he’d been, to assume what was best for Neil and Kevin. He had never lost someone he’d loved before; that was on of the pros of never letting yourself love anyone. He’d never fallen apart, left his old life, and spent every morning staring at a rock with his dead boyfriend’s name on. He knew Kevin spoke to Neil’s grave, so he imagined Kevin had rehearsed what he’d say to Neil a million times over.

“If you could speak to Tilda again, would you?” 

_I think it’s a different situation._

“I know,” Andrew said. _I do not know if I am doing the right thing._

Aaron chuckled under his breath, _I thought you just assumed that what you wanted was always the right thing._

_It was the just thing to do,_ Andrew bit. No, actually bit, he may not have spoke but his teeth were grinding together in a way that made Aaron’s jaw clench too. 

“Whatever,” he said, as if _whatever_ would fix every bullet hole in their relationship. “Is this where he’s buried?” 

The idea of Neil’s rotting corpse was probably less jarring to Aaron than Andrew. Of course, Aaron had never seen Neil. To him, Neil was a poltergeist, a dark force that attacked his brother. To Andrew, Neil was just a boy. A stupid, impulsive, lying boy. Maybe not just that, but to Andrew, he wasn’t a past tense. When Andrew got home, Neil would still be there, not under the soil in a wooden box. There. He’d probably have to throw something at him to get him off his bed, or bump into him trying to get to the bathroom. 

Andrew just nodded again, and Aaron realised he’d be doing the leg work for this conversation. He craned his neck to look out the window, “Are we going in?”

When he turned back to his twin, his lips were pursed and he wore a pensive look. To be honest, Andrew always looked distant, but this was different. He was a silhouette in front of a rainy splattered window, his breath forming clouds in front of him. Finally, he spoke, “Why did Kevin transfer to UMB?”

Aaron shrugged quickly, more like a squirm. “I don’t actually know, all I know is that the Ravens are all kinds of controlling… It hasn’t exactly been easy for Kevin since, so.” He paused until he couldn’t deal with the silence again, “Do you think it had something to do with Neil?”

_Do you?_

“Maybe it would make sense? Left for grief? The Ravens work in pairs but Kevin wasn’t Nathaniel’s pair, Jean Moreau was. So, why?” He was throwing off a train of thought like he was getting somewhere, but he was on the wrong track.

_They were romantically involved, of course._

_What?_

_They were fucking. God, you are dense._

“Why are we here?” Aaron changed the topic quickly. 

“Kevin comes here every morning to visit Neil’s grave,” Andrew told him.

_Do you think that’s why he’s here? To be closer to Neil?_ thought Aaron. 

Andrew took a deep breath in, “That’s a little grim, is it not?”

“I don’t know,” Aaron said. The rain was picking up from a drizzle to torrential downfall, and Aaron didn’t want to walk home, so he made a mental note not to piss Andrew off. He slouched in his seat and sighed.

In the rearview mirror, Aaron saw a tall figure dressed in blue jeans and a heavy black coat storming through the rain. _He’s here,_ he told Andrew.

Without warning, Andrew started the car and pulled out sharply. It shook Aaron in his seat hard enough to give him whiplash. “What the fuck, Andrew?” He exclaimed.

He broke just as sharply, “Do you want to get out and speak to him?”

“This was your idea,” Aaron said.

Really, it wasn’t Andrew’s idea, just how Aaron perceived it. Really, Andrew just needed to remind himself how dead Neil really was, to think straight. To come to a decision, he needed to think how Kevin thought, and where Kevin thought. However, it was inconclusive, so he decided to speak to Neil first. 

“Text him, tell him he can speak to Neil today.” Andrew ordered him. 

“He hasn’t been answering my texts,” replied Aaron.

_That seems counterproductive._

Aaron hummed shortly.

_Go tell him now._

“Fuck no!”

“Would you rather me do it?” Andrew threatened, because Aaron knew if his twin had to get Kevin to come to house, he would not be friendly. It was kind of a good cop, bad cop situation - except the cops in this analogy, are the criminals. 

Aaron threw the car door open with the same force he threw himself out of it. The rain immediately a cold shock against his skin, he shouted, “Day! Get in the car!” 

Kevin turned around to look at him, his face unreadable, or maybe that was the distance, or how the rain disrupted his view. He charged Aaron’s way, his hands in his pockets pulling his coat tightly over him. 

“What the fuck, Minyard,” he spat as he got into the backseat. 

“You weren’t answering my texts,” he said back through gritted teeth. If it wasn’t for Andrew, he would have just ignored Kevin for the rest of his time at college. He wasn’t all that confrontational, but he wasn’t stupid either. This needed to happen, now Andrew had set it into action. 

_I fucking hate you,_ he seethed. He saw Andrew raise a slight eyebrow that was nothing more than showing his apathy. 

Kevin was shivering in the backseat, mostly from nerves. “We’re going to the house?”

“Yes,” Aaron said. 

The drive was silent, the twins did not even communicate, but it wasn’t necessary, Andrew could feel Aaron’s anger. He deflected it easily, eyes trained on the road. He turned into the drive, the car engine silencing to make way for the sound of the storm battering the car windows. Aaron tried to shoot Andrew a cautious look, but he was out of the car before he could. 

Aaron got out the other side and opened the door for Kevin, who used all his nervous energy to get himself to the door of the house. He hadn’t been there many times, the majority of his childhood being spent at Evermore. Neither had Neil, it was never really his home, it was training grounds just like Evermore was. 

Kevin felt a hand on his, and looked to see Aaron slipping a smooth stone into his hand. “It’s protection, from bad energy.” He muttered. Tiger’s eye. It was striped shades of bronze and black, wrapped in a coil of metal on a thin chain. Katelyn had given it to Aaron to protect him from the bad energy in the house. “And keep you calm, and grounded.” He closed his palm around it, probably not believing it would help, but he’d take any he could get. 

Shooting Aaron a skeptic look, Andrew lead them into the house. _I thought you said witchcraft was hogwash?_ He said, the questioning nature of the words made Aaron feel like he’d said it from behind him, too close. But he was striding across the floor into the living room. 

_There is some scientific reasoning behind crystal magic, plus he needs some reassurance._

“Wait here,” he ordered Kevin. “I need to find him.”

He could just utter Neil’s full name and have him appear into the living room, but he wouldn’t do this without warning - Neil had a tendency to bolt. He walked to the basement door and heard Kevin said behind him, “Is he down there?” He said, his voice croaky and worried. He’d been down there before, when he was too young, he’d seen things that never really left him. He didn’t like to think about how much of it Neil had seen, how much blood he’d drawn.

“I told you to wait,” Andrew said, “I also told you I’m going to find him.”

Kevin backed away, Aaron ushering him to sit down. He distantly heard Andrew mutter, “Are you ignorant, stupid, or just auditorily challenged?” 

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Aaron asked. 

“Aaron,” he said, but it meant _sorry._ “I just need to speak to him, one last time.”

“He can’t even speak back to you,” Aaron replied. It was probably harsh, but he didn’t need to have high expectations for this. Kevin pursed his lips and rubbed his thumb over the surface of the crystal. “We can use this as a pendulum though, maybe. Or he could write something.”

“It’s okay,” Kevin said, sighing. “I know what I need to tell him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hate to leave it at that but !!! i wanted to upload something this week, plus the next part of this is going to HEAVY so
> 
> i wanna quickly thank everyone who regularly comments on this fic, you guys keep me going!! <3


	23. LIGHTNING

“Neil,” he whispered, stepping into the dark basement. The smell of dust and iron tickled his nose, he rubbed his arm against his face in attempt to ignore it. “I don’t mean to alarm you, but Kevin’s in the living room.”

He heard a clatter and a “fuck!” from behind the metal table, and then Neil appeared from behind it. He didn’t fade into view, simply stood up. He looked like he’d been thrown into the air, fast-thinking fear clear in his eyes. 

“Are you ready?” Andrew asked.

Neil hopped onto the table to sit, eyebrows furrowed and gaze trained on his shoes. “I think I’m ready… How is he?”

Andrew looked up, “I’m sure he has been better.”

He didn’t respond, but got down again and headed towards the stairs. 

"Neil," Andrew said sternly. "Know now, this is not your old life. That is gone now. I know that you're aware of the repercussions, but remember that you are dead."

Neil grabbed Andrew's hand sharply and put it under the hem of his shirt. The fabric fell over him like mist, and his hand made contact with Neil's skin. It was scarred, fresh but dry. A jagged mess of ripped skin up his torso. Neil moved Andrew's hand to follow the scar, looking up at him as he did. It was like he could feel Neil’s heartbeat, but not on his skin, like waves crashing in his ears. It was intrusive and overwhelming, beating against Andrew’s own chest. 

“Andrew, I couldn’t forget if I wanted to,” he said.

Reaching out just slightly, Andrew let his hand stay inches from Neil’s face, hesitant to touch. He let his arm flop back down to his side and nodded towards the stairs. Neil raced up them supernaturally fast, Andrew followed after. 

But when he got there he saw Neil hovering in the doorway, watching an unaware Kevin. Andrew caught up and stood behind him, he could almost feel Neil leeching off his energy but he didn’t mind. “He-” Neil choked, “-he looks so much older.”

Andrew inspected Kevin, someone who he wouldn’t have served in the bar, who actually was almost 2 years older than himself. He wouldn’t have thought he looked older, but he hadn’t seen him before. He supposed he could see it now, his sharp jawline, and weary creases in between his eyebrows- it had been a long 2 years.

He watched Neil take a nervous step forward. And another, more, until he was stood in front of Kevin, who was sat on the couch, hunched with his elbows on his knees. He crouched down to be at eye-level to him, but Kevin still couldn’t see him. He looked up though, Aaron knew he could sense the shift in the air, but nothing else. 

“He’s here,” Aaron told him.

Andrew glanced Aaron’s way, impressed that he picked up on the slight detail. He let out a slow nod but looked back to Neil. Kevin had lifted his head to look at the space where Neil was, looking straight through him. 

“Neil?” He asked, the word familiar but out of use on his lips. He missed saying that name. 

“I’m here,” Neil said, putting his hand on Kevin’s. 

Kevin jumped at the sensation, collapsing back on the couch with his legs pulled up off the ground. 

“That’s just him, he put his hand on yours,” Andrew informed him. 

Gingerly, Kevin outstretched his hand for Neil to take it again. Neil turned it over in his hand, inspecting the scarring on the top of his hand. Kevin could feel the cold of his fingertip along the sensitive skin. 

“What happened?” Neil asked.

“Neil,” Andrew said, “Write it down.”

Aaron picked up a notepad and pen from by the phone and… He wasn’t sure how to hand it to Neil. He held it in the air and waited for him to take it. He watched it float out of his hand when Neil grasped it, it shook with nerves. 

Neil was very much out of practice when it came to writing, his hand craned awkwardly around the pen. He wrote in scribbly, space out letters: _What happened?_ Then pointing his pen to Kevin’s hand. 

“This isn’t happening,” Kevin whispered. He’d seen that pen move on it own, but it could be lack of sleep playing with his brain. He’d never managed to sleep these days, and with no bunk to sneak into anymore when he couldn’t, he stayed awake and let himself replay over what he would say to Neil if he just could. 

“It’s happening,” Aaron said, “We’ll leave you alone now.” 

Aaron walked to the door, gesturing for Andrew to follow him away. And gesturing again because Andrew was not taking his eyes off where Neil was. He muttered something about privacy as he herded Andrew into the kitchen, doors shut behind them. 

Neil watched them leave before tapping the paper again, making Kevin’s heart jump just the same. “My hand,” Kevin said, wondering whether he should lie. _A skiing accident,_ his brain supplied. But he could never really lie to Neil, because like knows like. Neil was a lot of things; talented, smart, beautiful. But he was a dirty liar sometimes. “It was Riko.”

Rushing to write, but unsure of what to say, Neil wanted to yell. He wanted to scream and holler and hurt Riko himself. He knew something like this would happen when he was gone. All he wanted to do was protect Kevin.

“He was scared I was getting better than him, so the bastard broke my hand,” Kevin said and broke out into a smile. He missed being able to talk so freely to Neil, to say those horrible things about Riko without consequence, to be his whole, true self around _someone._

On the paper, Neil had written: _I love that smile._

He had so many questions about Riko, but he realised he didn’t want to ask them. He didn’t need that poor excuse for a man to taint anymore of their time together. He wrapped his fingers around Kevin’s, who tenitavely move against him, unsure of whether he was real. 

“Neil,” He said, more sure of it now. He could feel him in the room even if he couldn’t see nor hear him. “I’m so sorry this happened, it’s all my fault.”

Neil wrote with his free hand, when he leaned over to do so his forehead touches Kevin’s just slightly, but so right. _It wasn’t your fault._

“If- if I had told you to stay with your dad, to do what he said. Then he wouldn’t have lashed out, you wouldn’t have died,” Kevin said shakily.

 _No. No. No._ The writing got scratchier and the pen indented deeper into the paper with each repetition. _The Moriyamas would have killed me if my father hadn’t, it wasn’t you._

Kevin inhaled deeply through his nose, “I can’t believe I never told you I loved you.”

The word ‘loved’ rung in Neil’s mind, reminding him what he lost, what he never had. He blocked it out with Andrew’s words: ‘Know now, this is not your old life. That is gone now. I know that you're aware of the repercussions, but remember that you are dead.’

He turned over Kevin’s hand again, “Can you still play?” He said before writing it down.

Kevin pursed his lips, feeling as if nothing had changed. Exy was still a priority; even in the afterlife, even when he’d just confessed his love. It was the kind of move he would have pulled 2 years ago- how did he end up like this? 

“Things got worse before then, you know. Without you there, Riko became even more violent,” Kevin said, he wouldn’t go into detail, because he knew it would break Neil’s heart to find out how Riko had treated Jean after Neil’s death. He came down even harder on him now he had no pair, punished him out of confusion rather than anger. Even Riko grieved Neil, in his own warped and egotistical way. 

Kevin continued on, pushing the thought from his mind. “This was just the final straw,” he held his hand up, feeling it press against Neil’s cold skin. “Edgar Allen released me from my contract… which is a nice way of putting it. I transfered to UMB, here. I still play, with my right hand.”

Neil couldn’t help but smile at Kevin’s resilience- his stubbornness, more like. Even if he was appalled at what had happened. It wasn’t surprising, but it set fire to his stomach with rage. He ignored it for the most part, but that just meant they had to speak about what was really bothering him.

 _I’m sorry,_ he wrote.

“Don’t you dare apologise to me, Neil. This is not your fault either,” Kevin said.

Neil let his hand fall out of Kevin’s, and wrote, _It doesn’t matter._

“What doesn’t matter?” Kevin asked. He didn’t know what to do with his hands now, he wanted to reach out to Neil, but couldn’t. 

In the kitchen, the twins communicated minimally. There wasn’t much to say. This was unusual, they never really had visitors. A few of Nicky’s friends had came and gone before, but no one wanted to linger in the place. Even those out of touch with the spirit world, like Kevin and Nicky, couldn’t bear the feeling. Andrew sipped on his hot chocolate and thought, before an opening door broke the silence. 

Nicky crept into the kitchen, shutting the door behind him. “Guys, why is Kevin fucking Day in our living room?” He asked in a hushed tone. “And I know I’m not dreaming, because in my dreams he isn’t crying and talking to himself.”

Aaron opened his mouth to talk, but shut it just as soon and turned to Andrew. He gritted his teeth in thought, it was a lot they hadn’t told Nicky, he wasn’t sure where to start- so he was as blunt as possible. “He’s talking to the ghost of The Butcher’s son.”

Nicky inhaled slowly through his nose, then ran his hands over his face. “Aaron?” He asked, irritation clear in his tone. His black curls were pushed back off his face and wet from the rain instead of falling every which way, his smile absent. It wasn’t the Nicky the twins liked to see, as much as they pretended to hate his enthusiasm and light-hearted humour. 

“He’s not joking,” Aaron said, “Even if he is being obtuse.” 

Sighing, Nicky walked to the cupboard and pulled out a glass and (almost empty) bottle of whiskey. “At least get the man a drink. What are we? Savages?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey!! okay now im splitting the chapter into 3?? why am i like this???
> 
> constructive criticism is not only accepted and encourages,,,, im beggign please help me. hmu on tumblr @kevinyard  
> thnks for reading!!


	24. OBLIVION

Andrew took the drink into Kevin, along with his own. He tried not to look at Neil, afraid for what he’d done by taking Kevin to him. It was a hard thing to do, even though Neil was the less visible of the two, he drew in Andrew’s attention like he had it on a hook. He took a sip of his whiskey before he spoke. 

“How are you?” 

These are words that sounded fake on Andrew’s lips, it was not a question he asked casually. But he couldn’t think of anything else to say, he just wanted to urge Kevin to talk. He just needed Kevin to fill the space of silence with his clouds again. Perhaps he was asking Neil too, because he could feel Neil shaking from across the room. 

It was like Kevin couldn’t hear Andrew either, because he didn’t even flinch a reaction at Andrew’s question, but moments later he came back to life. He downed the whiskey, stood up sharply and said, “I should leave.” But his eyes flickered to Neil too quickly.

“Ask him to stay,” Neil asked, tone authoritative but eyes pleading.

“Stay awhile,” Andrew responded a little too fast, but didn’t take his eyes off Neil’s own, intrusive. “I can drive you back.”

Kevin was fidgeting as if Neil was poking his ghostly fingers into his ribs whenever he squirmed, which he was not. “I- I really should go,” Kevin said, switching from nervously pulling at his coat sleeves to shoving his hands in his pockets. 

Andrew could hear the familiar rattle of Nicky and Aaron in the kitchen, the distinct smell of Nicky’s cooking was tingling his nose and almost making his eyes water. It was his home, which was strange to think. Home wasn’t something Andrew had managed to get used to for long, just houses and faces he stayed with temporarily. And his new home didn’t feel homely, of course, he lived in a haunted house for God’s sake. 

He didn’t think this had truly been Neil’s home either. Even now, he looked out of place walking through it’s halls. Still, it was strange to think that terrible, terrible people had lived in this house. But Andrew was just another terrible, terrible person. 

This was home, but perhaps Kevin could fit in their jigsaw for now, if it’s what Neil needed. He thought maybe Neil would cross over if he spoke to Kevin, finished his business, and something about that made Andrew want to ask Kevin to leave. It was selfish, to want to keep Neil all to himself, but Andrew was not kind- especially not to strangers like Kevin.

He snatched his keys off the table, and spoke dryly, “If you are sure.” 

Neil felt like his whole body was burning, up from his fingertips to his neck, scalding the skin on his back. He didn’t want Kevin to leave, but at the same time, seeing him just made him hurt more. If he were alive, he’d say that he couldn’t live with or without Kevin- but really, he couldn’t live at all. He made himself disappear, forcing himself out of view. 

He watched Andrew and Kevin leave, his eyes trained on the car until it disappeared around the corner. Then he tried, he tried so hard not to exist. Before Andrew moved in, he’d had no trouble fading in and out of consciousness as he pleased, but maybe that was time lost due to solitude. Maybe he’d gone mad in that time.

In the kitchen, Aaron was hunched over his drink, not to talking to Nicky. But that didn’t mean his cousin wasn’t talking at him. “I just wish I knew what was going on with you two sometimes- it’s not even because I can’t hear what you say to each other, I can’t understand what I do hear!” He was faced away, stirring whatever greater evil he was cooking while he spoke. 

“It’s all Andrew, I don’t understand either,” Aaron shrugged. “Maybe it’s because he has no living friends, he’s got to make friends with ghosts?”

“And that’s completely fine, you know? But inviting the ghost’s ex-boyfriend over, what kind of sadistic shit is that?”

Aaron furrowed his eyebrows in though, “I thought it was him trying to be nice.”

Nicky just sighed. “I wouldn’t like to be in either of your heads,” he muttered, rifling the cupboards.

Aaron wondered if he should tell Nicky about Katelyn, because a part of him just _wanted to._ He wasn’t used to it, as a generally reserved and secretive person, he didn’t open up about things like this. Especially things like his feelings for Katelyn, which made him vulnerable. He didn’t like that feeling, he understood why Andrew would warn him against- no, forbid him from things like that. But the more time he spent with Katelyn, he felt infinitely wiser, because what Andrew had never realised was that vulnerability is worth it. For the right person, letting down defences is what you need.

Besides, they’d made it through high school, they were adults now (as much as Nicky would protest to that statement). Aaron didn’t need Andrew’s toxic deals and ideas of protection. He hated it. With Katelyn he felt himself, that all his thoughts and feeling were his own, like he couldn’t hear Andrew in his mind anymore.

“Nicky,” Aaron started, his voice hoarse. He hummed in response, waiting for Aaron to continue. “Are you sure it’s not Andrew just trying to push my friends away? I know it’s self-centered to think, but this is the first time I’ve had friends, really.”

Nicky pursed his lips. “I don’t think it’s that,” he said, his face still contorted in thought. “Also ‘friends’ plural? Not just Kevin?”

Aaron stuttered, “W- Well yeah.” Katelyn wasn’t really a friend, well he hoped not. But for the purposes of this conversation, she was.

“Don’t panic, I’m not gonna tell on you. I’m just happy for you,” Nicky said, in the most patronizing way. But then he walked away from the stove and to the opposite side of the countertop to Aaron. “And I don’t know enough about how Andrew thinks to give you any advice. That,” he tapped Aaron’s head for good measure, “is all you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is either late or early??? ive lost all track of time!!!  
> thank u for reading nonetheless, comment and kudos if you liked <3 and if u didnt i could use some constructive criticism or if you have an questions im down to answer


	25. [ announcement ]

hey so im really sorry 2 say this, but all you can all see from the past couple chapters and how long it's been since i updated, this story has kinda got away from me. idk it got hard to write after a while, considering how god damn depressing it is and i felt under a lot of pressure to keep them happy. then i kinda lost where i was going with the plot, so it's going on hiatus until i can finish it. thank u for reading up to here. so, to be continued... <3


End file.
